Lister Shedden Sinclair

Sinclair, Lister Shedden

Lister Shedden Sinclair, writer, actor, critic, producer, mathematician (b at Bombay, India 9 Jan 1921; d at Toronto 16 Oct 2006). Son of a Scottish engineer, Sinclair was educated at St Paul's, London, UBC and U of T, where he lectured in mathematics before beginning his lengthy association with the CBC in 1944. A true Renaissance man, his eclectic interests included ornithology, astronomy, music, linguistics and anthropology. He was a prolific, prize-winning playwright whose plays included The Blood Is Strong: A Drama of Early Scottish Settlement in Cape Breton (1956) and Socrates (1957), and contributed numerous plays to CBC radio, some of which are collected in A Play on Words and Other Radio Plays (1948). He held key positions with the CBC, including actor, panellist, critic, commentator, executive vice-president and vice-president, program policy and development, and was involved with such important television series as Man at the Centre and The Nature of Things. Sinclair was perhaps best known as the mellifluous former host of the sophisticated "Ideas" series and its summer replacement, "A is for Aardvark". Throughout his distinguished career, he received many broadcasting honours, including the prestigious international George Foster Peabody Award. He held honorary doctorates from 4 universities. In 1985, he was invested as an officer of the Order of Canada.