Journeyman showcases many of the qualities that have come to define Timothy Findley’s presence on Canada’s national literary stage. In this collection of articles, speeches, and journal entries that he began compiling years before his death in 2002, Findley’s charm, intellect, and indomitable prose style are readily apparent. William Whitehead, Findley’s companion of some 40 years, has lovingly assisted with gathering and editing short pieces from each of the decades spanning Findley’s life as an actor and writer.

These pieces have been creatively ordered into four sections dealing with travel, sojourns in the past and future, and Findley’s craft as a writer and and an actor/playwright. Throughout this book, a balance is struck between lightweight and more serious articles.

The first few pages have a Leacockesque feel, as a series of pleasant holidays and car purchases are humorously described. Accounts of Findley’s 1974 Klondike expedition for the CBC and trip to Moscow in 1955 with a company of actors are delightful, as is the depiction of his early tutorage by Alec Guinness. Findley’s sense of timing and affinity for the dramatic demonstrate that he never really left the stage. He is at his most exuberant writing about the calling of the playwright: “There is nothing – nothing – on the face of the earth that equals the live performance of a play – an opera – a ballet. Playwrighting is a living art,” he wrote in 1999.

This book is beautifully framed by two photographs of Findley as an intense-looking youth with windswept hair and rumpled shirt, and as an elegant older gentleman. Journeyman will appeal to Findley fans and further define his contribution to Canadian literature: a confidence, a Gothic touch, a soupçon of flair.