"The Dictionary of Canadian Biography calls this work 'probably the greatest Canadian biography yet published in English.' Donald Creighton's two-volume study of Canada's first Prime Minister was originally published in the 1950s, and each of the volumes won a Governor General's Literary Award. Sir John A. Macdonald's flamboyant personality dominated Canadian public life from the years preceding Confederation to the end of the nineteenth century. The political structures and national policies which developed under his leadership continue to shape public issues today. Creighton brought a rare combination of rigorous scholarship, magnificent literary style, and romantic and heroic vision to his biography of Macdonald. These qualities give his writing extraordinary power, and explain the work's appeal for both students of history and general readers. P.B. Waite's introduction to this new one-volume republication provides an illuminating account of the impact that Creighton and his biography of Macdonald had on a whole generation of historians and readers."-- Provided by publisher.