Phoenix

Contributor: Roderick Stewart Roderick Stewart (1934-2018) was a writer and teacher of history. He was the co-author of several biographies on Norman Bethune, including Bethune in Spain. --- Contributor: Sharon Stewart Sharon Stewart has over twenty-five years of experience as a writer and as a freelance editor in educational publishing.

"The Stewarts have done an extraordinary job in their new biography. They travelled to many of the places where Bethune lived and worked, talked to old Party members who remembered him, and assimilated much new material into their narrative. The book is beautifully written, with a clear narrative. Providing excellent background information on the times, they keep Bethune in the foreground and make him a much more complex, exasperating, and admirable man than the pottery statue of Chinese propaganda." The Tyee --- "Phoenix makes a compelling read. Phoenix is both readable and authoritative. It dispels many of the myths which have grown around Bethune, and presents him warts and all. The book will be a valuable contribution to history's view of Bethune." Spectrum --- "At long last, the whole Bethune—flaws and contradictions intact, making the extraordinary accomplishments of this troubled and near tragic figure all the more remarkable to unravel. I was riveted, from beginning to end." Ken Gass, Artistic Director, Fact --- "Thorough, objective, well-written, exhaustive and highly readable, Phoenix should become the definitive basis for all serious discussion of Bethune." The Globe and Mail --- "Phoenix ... accomplishes in magisterial fashion what any good biography should do: it reveals the complexity of its subject." The Bulletin of the History of Medicine