AT 84, HE'S STILL A STAR

Berton Looks Fragile These Days, But The Prolific Author Says He
Enjoys Having Reached An Age Where He Is Free To Speak His Mind

Interview With Pierre Berton

Pierre Berton, the man who immortalized the Klondike, is now
associated with the kind of rush that has nothing to do with gold.

Since offering his advice on how to roll a joint on Rick Mercer's
Monday Report on Oct. 18, the noted Canadian author has become a hero
to those who would like to see marijuana legalized.

Interviewed by The Gazette after his appearance at the Harbourfront
International Literary Festival in Toronto last Saturday, Berton said
he did the TV spot "because they asked me."

Did he inhale?

No. Not on the show, but, "I used to," he replied, with a
chuckle.

Although Berton, who just launched his 50th book, dismisses his
televised advice to "high" rollers as a spoof, he's serious about the
message conveyed.

"I'm so upset about the stupid marijuana laws anyway," he said. "I
wanted to strike a blow for freedom."

As far as he's concerned, marijuana should be treated just like booze.
"We're putting more money into searching out marijuana users than we
are into searching out child molesters," he said.

Ever the historian, Berton continued, "I think we should do exactly
what the Americans did (when they repealed prohibition in 1933).
Before that bill came in, you couldn't buy a drink. Drinking was
considered evil. They had the worst kind of prohibition, which
resulted in a criminal class of enormous numbers. We're getting the
same thing here. And I want to see it stopped."

Dramatic pause. "Hell, there's worse things than smoking a
joint."

That being said, "I wouldn't write a line under the influence of
either booze or marijuana. I think it does affect your judgment,
relaxes you, which is a bad thing for a writer trying to get a book
done. And it confuses you. I wouldn't use it except for recreational
purposes."

Not everyone was pleased when Berton's Monday Report gambit aired
(coincidentally) the day after a $12.5-million library was named in
his honour in Vaughan, Ont. At the library opening, he added fuel to
the fire by telling parents to mind their own business and let kids
read whatever trash they wanted.

But he's not ducking for cover. "I don't give a goddamn what I say
anymore," he said, his voice rising to that familiar Berton crescendo.
"I've reached the age where I can say anything I want and nobody pays
any attention anyway. It's a feeling of freedom. And I enjoy it."

He also still very much enjoys talking about his books and meeting his
fans, as he did last Saturday. When he read from his latest work,
Prisoners of the North, at the Studio Theatre, he played to the Book
Television cameras, modulating his voice and gesturing with his free
hand, ever the star broadcaster.

Berton continues to wear the trademark bow tie of his Front Page
Challenge days. But at 84, he's a thinner man, poignantly fragile, and
in need of a cane or a wheelchair to get around.

Since Prisoners of the North was launched a few weeks ago, he has been
insisting that this is his last book. Over a tuna sandwich in the
boardroom of the Harbourfront Centre, however, he qualified that. "If
I came across a subject I wanted to write about and it didn't take too
much research ..." In other words, no more Canadian history books. But
another bit of fluff like his Cats I Have Known and Loved might be a
possibility. Still, "I think 50 books is enough for anybody," he said.
"And I've reached a stage in life where I have several infirmities
which are causing me problems and slowing me down. I need a lot more
sleep than I used to and that takes a lot of time."

A Berton historical tome along the lines of Prisoners of the North,
which includes five mini-biographies of colourful characters
associated with northern Canada, takes him about one year for the
research, another for the writing. "And some of them are much longer
than that," he said. All of them are typed out, two-finger style, on
an electric typewriter. Berton avoids the computer and having once
tried dictation, says it just doesn't work - for him. "You tend to
become too verbose," he explained. "It isn't tight enough. It isn't a
writer's method."

Choosing his five subjects wasn't easy, he said. All are people he's
come across in past archival forays. He started with a longer list,
eliminated two or three, then added a couple, including poet Robert
Service, a special favourite. Berton grew up across the street from
Service's cabin in Dawson City.

"I wanted people who were characters in themselves, but who were also
obsessed by the North," he said.

If only one of them is a woman, it's because the Yukon was very much a
man's country, Berton said. And some obvious choices, like politician
Martha Munger Black, whom Berton knew personally, had already been
well documented elsewhere. Another, whose name did not readily come to
his mind, had been eliminated because Barbara Sears, his faithful
research assistant, had dismissed her as "second-rate." Lady Jane
Franklin, wife of the explorer, won out.

Yes, Berton listens to the women around him, especially Sears, his
agent Elsa Franklin, and most of all his beloved Janet, mother of his
eight children (latest grandchild count: 14).

That Janet fell and broke her hip (also the day after the library
opening) has clearly shaken him to the core. He cancelled his first
scheduled appearance at the festival that Wednesday not only because
he was rushed to the hospital himself (over a nosebleed triggered by
blood-thinning medication) but because she was already there,
recuperating from hip surgery. It will be two or three weeks before
she's released, he said.

For Berton, it had been quite a week. Under the circumstances, he
could easily have bowed out of the festival - and this interview -
entirely. But he didn't.

Like those tundra-crossing characters in his books, he just forged
ahead.

The subject of legacy doesn't interest Berton much. "I don't give a
damn what happens after I'm dead," he had told his Harbourfront
audience earlier.

But his eyes lit up when we talked about the Pierre Berton House
writer's retreat in Dawson City. Chosen writers get to live in his
home digs rent free, plus $2,000 month for three months. Duties? None.
"They don't have to do anything. That's my rule," he said. Since 1996,
20 books have been conceived there.

Too soon, our interview was over. As we rode the elevator, one last
question.

Did he prefer print or broadcast journalism?

"Print," he replied, without hesitation.

When we reached street level, I reached for his hand to say goodbye.
Then I watched as he was wheeled out the door, down the ramp, toward
the waiting car and driver. Now it was my turn to write about a feisty
maverick from the Yukon.

Prisoners of the North, by Pierre Berton, Doubleday Canada, 317 pages,
$39.95.