In his 2 terms as prime minister, from 1963–1968, Lester B. Pearson oversaw the revamping of Canada through the introduction of Medicare, the Canada Pension Plan, the Commission on Bilingualism and Biculturalism, the Auto Pact, and the new Maple Leaf flag. Pearson came to power after an impressive career as a diplomat, where he played a vital role in the creation of NATO and the United Nations, later serving as president of its General Assembly. He put Canada on the world stage when he won the 1957 Nobel Peace Prize for his handling of the Suez Crisis, during which he brokered the formation of a UN peacekeeping force. Author Andrew Cohen, whose books have focused on Canada’s place in the world, is the perfect author to assess Pearson’s legacy.

"Andrew Cohen's new biography... is so rich a portrait... of a man whom I had always admired, but about whom, I have just discovered, I didn't know the half. Or even 10 per cent"

"Cohen's life of Pearson is one of the new entries in Penguin Book's Extraordinary Canadians series... (which) claims that these are all people who have changed us. And if the other subjects come within a country mile of the Mike (as he was known) Pearson, whose life Cohen compellingly recounts, I expect the claim will stand up, and that a not-insignificant part of the change will come with the reading."

"Here is a Mike Pearson whom, I suspect, few knew much about... Well, I sort of knew some of this stuff, but having it swim before you all at once in a fluid stream of concise and sparely written biography makes it feel as fresh as though you were meeting the man for the first time."

"Cohen follows his award-winning editorial style... of lucid and straight-forward journalistic narrative, largely chronological (though with a few enticing leaps forward here and past remembered events there) in a way that keeps you reading, confident there will be another good story on the next page."

"A book like this... is bound to become a reference work..."
—Patrick Watson, The Globe and Mail

"I read, in one sitting (this) luminous biography of Lester Pearson. I am not kidding when I tell you that it is the very best biography I have read this year, and that includes the quite terrific new biography of FDR by H.W. Brands that I am reading right now. It reminds me in quality and wit of the great Blake biography of Disraeli. This is a terrific monument to Pearson, to be sure..."
—David Shribman, Editor, The Pittsburgh Post Gazette and Winner of the Pulitzer Prize

"Cohen's sketch of the engaging Pearson is exemplary: scholarly, candid, lively and, always, intriguing, a book which provokes interest and invites readers to look further into Pearson's astonishing career."
—London Free Press

"With wit and sympathy, Cohen sketches the character of Pearson as the young would-be fighter pilot during the First World War; as the unprepossessing academic; as the loyal family man; as the smart diplomat during the Second World War and after; as the far-seeing prime minister who called Quebec "a nation within a nation" and created policies and programs we consider quintessentially Canadian today."

"Were this merely a small, elegantly written biography, it wouldn't have been worth Cohen's time. But Cohen saw in Pearson's story the opportunity for a political lament. And no one—except perhaps John Ralston Saul—is better than Andrew Cohen at the political lament."
—The Ottawa Citizen

"Mr. Cohen's writing, marked by clarity, readability and imaginativeness, is a pleasure to peruse. In contrast to the often pedantic and academic tone of many biographies, Mr. Cohen's style is exemplary of the plain style he demands of his students at the Carleton School of Journalism."

"And like any good biography, this one puts into perspective the great struggles of a man's life, such as Pearson's decades-long struggle for true Canadian independence, which, as the reader learns, took more than just the Statute of Westminster to achieve."

Mr. Cohen (is) one of Canada's most articulate advocates for a beefier Canadian demarche on the world stage..."
—Embassy Magazine

Lester Pearson's lessons for today's defeated Liberals TheStar.com - Opinion
Unlikely politician shrewdly rebuilt party and led it back to power five years after debacle
October 22, 2008
Andrew Cohen

On March 31, 1958, Lester Pearson and his wife, Maryon, watched John Diefenbaker and the Conservatives sweep back into office with 208 seats, the largest parliamentary majority in the country's history. more »