John Buchan’s best-known creation, The Thirty-Nine Steps, turns an ordinary man into a fugitive caught in a plot against national security. Its pace and resourceful hero helped establish Buchan as a writer of adventure fiction, but the novel was one strand of a much broader career. He was also a historian, journalist, publisher, politician and British Army officer. In 1935 he became Governor General of Canada, where he championed a distinct Canadian identity and helped establish national literary awards.
From Perth to Oxford
Buchan was born in Perth, Scotland, on 26 August 1875, the eldest child of John Buchan, a Free Church of Scotland minister, and Helen Jane Buchan. The family later moved to Kirkcaldy, and he attended Hutchesons’ Boys’ Grammar School in Glasgow. At 17, he won a scholarship to the University of Glasgow, where he studied classics, wrote poetry and began publishing. He went on to Brasenose College, Oxford, to read Greek and Latin classics. Scholarships supported his studies; he won the Stanhope essay prize in 1897 and the Newdigate Prize for poetry the following year, and became president of the Oxford Union.
His early books already ranged across forms. His first novel appeared in 1895, and his Oxford years brought short stories and adventure novels including John Burnet of Barns and The Half-Hearted. After graduating, he read for the Bar and was called in 1901. That September he travelled to South Africa to work as private secretary to Alfred Milner, the British High Commissioner. The experience informed later writing, including the South African setting of Prester John, published in 1910. Buchan returned to London in 1903, resumed work as a barrister and journalist, and joined the publishing firm Thomas Nelson & Sons in 1906. He also served as deputy editor of The Spectator.
A thriller shaped by war
Buchan published The Thirty-Nine Steps in 1915. Set shortly before the First World War, the spy thriller follows Richard Hannay, who becomes entangled in an alleged threat to the country and must evade pursuit while trying to expose it. Hannay, one of Buchan’s recurring heroes, drew in part on Edmund Ironside, whom Buchan had known in South Africa. A sequel, Greenmantle, followed in 1916. The story’s later reputation owes something to its adaptations: Alfred Hitchcock’s 1935 film, starring Robert Donat, altered the plot substantially while bringing Hannay to a new audience.
The First World War made writing and public service overlap. Buchan began a history of the war for Nelson’s that eventually ran to 24 volumes. He worked in the Foreign Office and reported from France for The Times. In 1916 he joined the British Army’s General Headquarters Intelligence Section on the Western Front, receiving a commission as a second lieutenant in the Intelligence Corps. The following year he became Director of Information, leading Britain’s wartime information effort. In 1918 he headed an intelligence department in the newly formed Ministry of Information.
Even while working closely with government and military leaders, Buchan sometimes criticised their conduct and decisions in his writing. After the war, he continued publishing fiction while turning more often to historical subjects. His work included biographies of Sir Walter Scott, Caesar Augustus and Oliver Cromwell. A life of the Marquess of Montrose won the James Tait Black Memorial Prize in 1928. In all, his output exceeded a hundred books, among them novels and collections of short stories.
Politics and the move to Canada
Buchan entered electoral politics in Scotland and, in a 1927 by-election, became Unionist MP for the Combined Scottish Universities. His politics included a belief in Scotland’s place as a nation within both the British Empire and the United Kingdom. He also served as president of the Scottish Historical Society, became a trustee of the National Library of Scotland and, in 1933 and 1934, represented the King as Lord High Commissioner to the General Assembly of the Church of Scotland. In 1933 he was appointed one of the first governors of the British Film Institute.
In 1935, King George V appointed Buchan Governor General of Canada on the advice of Canadian Prime Minister R. B. Bennett. Buchan was raised to the peerage as Baron Tweedsmuir and took office on 2 November. He was the first Governor General appointed after the Statute of Westminster had come into force, a change that reflected Canada’s growing constitutional independence. The role required more than formal representation. Buchan travelled extensively, including to the Arctic, and argued that the office should help its holder understand the country’s regions and communities.
He supported Canadian unity without insisting that it meant uniformity. In a 1937 speech, he said that a Canadian’s first loyalty was to Canada and Canada’s King. He also argued that different ethnic groups should retain their individuality and contribute to the country’s character. His remarks about a Canadian identity did not always please imperialists, but they reflected his effort to treat Canada as a country with its own political and cultural life.
Culture was central to that effort. Buchan encouraged the establishment of the Governor General’s Literary Awards in 1936, after discussions with the Canadian Authors Association. The awards, known as the “GGs”, continue to recognise writing in English and French. He and Lady Tweedsmuir also established the first proper library at Rideau Hall. In 1940, he invited influential Canadians to consider developing film production in British Columbia, writing to his sister about the possibility of “a Hollywood in British Columbia”.
War, legacy and remembrance
Buchan’s final years in office coincided with growing international tension and the start of the Second World War. He worked with Prime Minister William Lyon Mackenzie King and US President Franklin D. Roosevelt in efforts to avert another conflict, although those efforts did not succeed. After Britain declared war on Germany in September 1939, Canada followed a week later. Buchan helped secure British agreement to an air-training plan in Canada, while respecting the Canadian government’s insistence that the facilities remain under its control.
He suffered a stroke on 6 February 1940 and died in Montreal five days later, aged 64. After lying in state in Ottawa, he received a state funeral at St Andrew’s Presbyterian Church. His ashes were returned to Britain aboard HMS Orion and buried at Elsfield in Oxfordshire, where he had lived. His literary reputation endured: The Thirty-Nine Steps became a model for later adventure writing, while his wider output included novels, short stories and histories. In Canada, his public legacy is also marked by the literary awards he helped create and by the example he set for later Governors General.
Why John Buchan deserves a place in British Legacy
Buchan’s place in British literary history rests not simply on the continuing popularity of The Thirty-Nine Steps, but on the craft behind a body of work that crossed adventure fiction, short stories, history and biography. He brought suspense and a strong sense of place to popular writing, while his experience as a journalist and wartime official connected him to the political events of his time. His career also makes clear that a writer can move between imaginative work and public responsibilities without either part being incidental: Buchan continued to write as he served in government, the Army and Parliament.
His British connection is equally evident in his Scottish upbringing, education at Glasgow and Oxford, service in British institutions and election as a Scottish Unionist MP. Yet his later work in Canada gives that story a wider dimension. As Governor General, he promoted Canadian unity while recognising the country’s distinct identity, and supported institutions that could give its writers and readers a lasting public platform. The Governor General’s Literary Awards remain a practical legacy of that commitment; the Rideau Hall library and his advocacy for Canadian culture belong to the same effort. Remembering Buchan in British Legacy therefore means recognising both the adventure writer whose work travelled across generations and the public servant who used his position to support cultural life in Britain’s closest historical partner.
Sources
Adapted in part from John Buchan by Wikipedia contributors, under CC BY-SA 4.0. Text has been edited and combined with the existing article; this adapted text is shared under the same licence. Contributor history.
