When Rex Murphy phoned me a week before he died, he was peppy and confident that he would be good for a few months more and that we might even be able to go to dinner again, though, he said, ”I hope you will not be embarrassed by my portable oxygen supply.”

He was under no illusions that the end would be along soon, and he was completely philosophical. Not a religious man, he felt that he had had pretty much the life he wanted: the ability to read very profoundly in English literature, to have a very wide range of acquaintances and friends and to have been able to disseminate his views in his own style throughout Canada for many years.