A List
4/28/03

SLU PROFESSOR NAMED MOLSON RESEARCH FELLOW

CANTON - St. Lawrence University Professor of Canadian Studies 
Robert W. Thacker has been appointed a Molson Research Fellow, 
which will allow him to take a sabbatical leave next year, 
conducting research in preparation for writing the biography 
of Canadian author Alice Munro.
	The fellowship is funded by a gift from Eric Molson, 
chairman of Molson Inc., and his wife, Jane Molson, of Montreal, 
through the Lincolnshire Foundation. 
	Thacker has begun work on Alice Munro: Writing Her 
Lives, an extended literary biography focused on Munro, her 
fiction, and her career. His research involves visits to 
archives and travel to interview people connected to Munro's 
career.
	"We are deeply grateful to the Molsons and the Lincolnshire 
Foundation for this spectacular gift," said University President 
Daniel F. Sullivan. "Their support of our Canadian studies 
program makes possible a level of attentiveness to Canada here 
at St. Lawrence that is distinctive among American liberal arts 
colleges and we value it greatly. Specifically, this gift will 
allow Professor Thacker the time necessary to explore this 
extraordinary opportunity, and for that, we are especially 
thankful."
	Eric and Jane Molson are the parents of St. Lawrence 
alumnus Geoffrey Molson '92, who married Kate Finn '92; Geoffrey 
is the vice-president, quality and distributor development, 
for Molson USA in Golden, Colorado. Eric Molson has served as 
chairman of Molson Inc. since 1988. He is also chancellor 
of Concordia University and a director of the Montreal General 
Hospital Foundation and Research Institute, the Canadian 
Irish Studies Foundation and Vie des Arts. 
	Eric and Jane Molson have also supported St. Lawrence 
University's Canadian Studies Endowment Fund through the 
Lincolnshire Foundation, establishing in 1993 the Molson Family 
Endowment for Canadian Studies.
	"We are delighted with this opportunity to support Dr. 
Thacker," Eric Molson said of the gift. "We have noted over the 
years his very important work in Canadian studies which extends 
to interested scholars, not only in the United States, but 
worldwide. We wish him well in this important endeavor."
	Widely regarded as among the best contemporary writers 
of short stories in English, Munro was born in Wingham, 
Ontario in 1931. After graduating from high school, she attended 
the University of Western Ontario from 1949-1951. Majoring in 
English, it was at Western where Munro began to publish in the 
undergraduate literary magazine. In 1951, she married James 
Munro and moved with him to Vancouver, where they began raising 
a family.  In 1963, they moved to Victoria and started Munro's 
Books, which remains the leading bookstore on Vancouver Island. 
During this time Munro's stories were read on C.B.C. radio and 
published in a variety of Canadian periodicals. When her 
marriage ended in 1972, Munro returned to southwestern Ontario. 
She and her second husband, whom she married in 1976, now divide 
their time between Clinton, Ontario and Comox, British Columbia.
	Munro has published a novel, Lives of Girls and Women 
(1971), and nine collections of short stories: Dance of the Happy 
Shades (1968), Something I've Been Meaning to Tell You (1976), 
Who Do You Think You Are? (1978; U.S. and U.K., The Beggar Maid), 
The Moons of Jupiter (1982), The Progress of Love (1986), Friend 
of My Youth (1990), Open Secrets (1994), The Love of a Good 
Woman (1998), and Hateship, Friendship, Courtship, Loveship, 
Marriage (2001). Her Selected Stories were published in 1996 
and a shorter selection, No Love Lost, has just been published 
by McClelland and Stewart, Toronto. Since the 1970s, Munro's 
stories have been frequently printed in periodicals such as 
The Paris Review, Atlantic Monthly and, especially, The New 
Yorker, which has itself published well over 40 of them.
	A faculty member at St. Lawrence since 1983, Thacker 
is a graduate of Bowling Green State University, with a master's 
degree from the University of Waterloo and the Ph.D. from the 
University of Manitoba. He is an expert on Canadian culture, 
especially literature, and has written extensively on the work of 
Munro, Willa Cather, and the North American literary west. 
	Thacker is the editor of The Rest of the Story: Critical 
Essays on Alice Munro (1999). He is the executive secretary and 
treasurer of the Western Literature Association and former 
editor of The American Review of Canadian Studies. Thacker has 
also been awarded a grant from the Canadian Embassy in 
Washington, D.C. to support research on the Munro biography.
	"This very generous gift means that I will have the time 
to complete this book - the project of a lifetime - properly," 
Thacker commented. "I offer sincere thanks to the Molsons and 
the Lincolnshire Foundation for their willingness to support my 
work."

-30-

Back To News Releases
Back to St. Lawrence Homepage