It was his wife, whom he married in 1936, who persuaded him to set his work in Canada, the country he knew best. He wrote two novels during those years, one set in Europe, the other in the USA. Oxyrhynchus:An Economic and Social Study, about the decline of a Roman colony in Egypt. Since he was refused a job at two Canadian universities and had a scholarship for Princeton University, he completed his Ph.D. His father was not pleased with her American background and insisted that he not marry before becoming independent. While sailing home in 1932, he met his future wife, Dorothy Duncan. While in Europe he traveled to Italy, Greece, Switzerland, France and Germany. In his 4th year, he spent more and more time on tennis and writing poetry, which was not accepted by the publishers to whom he sent it. He worked incredibly hard there but only reached second-class. Frances had no interest in these subjects, but Hugh did well in them, first at Dalhousie University, winning a Rhodes Scholarship to Oxford. Both Frances and Hugh were pushed hard in their schooling by their father, especially in the Classics. He became good at sports, winning the men's N.S. 1917, which Hugh later wrote about in his first published novel, Barometer Rising. When they returned to Canada, they settled briefly in Sydney, before moving permanently to Halifax where they experienced the Explosion in Dec. In 1913 they went to London where Samuel took courses for a medical specialty. His father was a stern Calvinist his mother, creative, warm and dreamy.

John Hugh MacLennan was born to Dr.Samuel MacLennan, a physician, and Katherine MacQuarrie in Glace Bay he had an older sister named Frances.

Barometer Rising by Hugh MacLennan