Poets

Sir Charles George Douglas Roberts, KCMG, FRSC was a Canadian poet and prose writer who is known as the Father of Canadian Poetry. He was "almost the first Canadian author to obtain worldwide reputation and influence; he was also a tireless promoter and encourager of Canadian literature.... He published numerous works on Canadian exploration and natural history, verse, travel books, and fiction." "At his death he was regarded as Canada's leading man of letters."

Besides his own body of work, Roberts is also called the "Father of Canadian Poetry" because he served as an inspiration and a source of assistance for other Canadian poets of his time.

Roberts, his cousin Bliss Carman, Archibald Lampman and Duncan Campell Scott are known as the Confederation Poets.

Life

Roberts was born in Douglas, New Brunswick in 1860, the eldest child of Emma Wetmore Bliss and Rev. George Goodridge Roberts (an Anglican priest). His brother Theodore Goodridge Roberts and sister, Jane Elizabeth Gostwycke Roberts, would also become authors.

Between the ages of 8 months and 14 years, Roberts was raised in the parish of Westcock, New Brunswick, near Sackville, by the Tantramar Marshes. He was homeschooled, "mostly by his father, who was proficient in Greek, Latin and French." He published his first writing, th..