Rt Hon Adrienne Clarkson

Photo of Adrienne Clarkson from speakermix

Adrienne Clarkson was born in 1939 in Hong Kong and came to Canada with her family as a child. She became Governor General in 1999 and held the post until 2005.

She grew up in Ottawa and took a BA in English Lit at the University of Toronto. Fluent in French as well as English, she did post-graduate work at the Sorbonne in Paris.

A well-known television journalist and author, Clarkson has held many interesting posts, including Chair of the board of the Canadian Museum of Civilization in Hull, executive producer of her own arts show at CBC and publisher at McClelland and Stewart.

During her time as Canada's Head of State, Clarkson was criticized in the House of Commons for going over budget following an expensive state visit to Russia, Finland and Iceland. However, she was proud of having modernized and transformed the role of governor general.

During her tenure, she also travelled to Kosovo and Afghanistan to visit Canadian troops and continued her work as a patron of the arts, creating the Governor General's Northern Medal. She also travelled widely within the country and became well-known to Canadians. Prime Minister Paul Martin, who was leading a minority government when her term was to have ended, asked her to stay on in the role for another year, which she did, in spite of some health challenges.

This remarkable woman is a Companion of the Order of Canada, has honorary degrees from seven Canadian universities and was named in 2007 as Colonel-in-Chief of the Princess Patricia's Canadian Light Infantry. In 2009, for a series on Extraordinary Canadians, she completed a book about Norman Bethune. Her website comments on this fascinating Montrealer as "reviled as a communist by some, revered as a humanitarian by others."

Room for All of Us (Penguin/Allen Lane, 2011) is her book of stories about the immigrant experience.

Clarkson is married to John Ralston Saul, Canada's self-declared public intellectual who became famous for his Massey Lectures series and book entitled The Unconscious Civilization.