Last week, Quillblog noted that the family of Peter Gzowski was speaking out against some of the claims made in an unauthorized biography of the CBC Radio broadcaster. In a comment posted to the blog, Gzowski author R.B. Fleming responds:

Re: the claim made by Alison Gzowski and siblings that they refused to speak to this mean spirited and ill informed biographer during the research and writing of Peter Gzowski, A Biography:

Really? My email records show exchanges with Alison and Peter C. Gzowski on subjects such as family birth dates, their father’s high school records and so on. Furthermore, on 8 July 2003 Peter C. had lunch at my place, during which we discussed, among other things, my proposed biography of his father. About a week later, Peter wrote to tell me that he had been in touch with Gillian Howard, his father’s last partner. In his email, he included the following from Ms. Howard: I suppose that a biography is inevitable, and I guess the only choice is whether it’s ˜authorized’ or ˜unauthorized’. In the first case, everyone cooperates and talks and in the second, everyone pretends it isn’t happening and bitches afterwards. Hmmm.

Would Peter Gzowski himself like this biography? Gillian Howard has already answered that question. Peter’s attitude, she wrote to Peter C. Gzowski in July 2003, would be one of discomfort but, given that he made his living asking questions of others, he would just shrug and hope that the effort would be a well-researched and interesting portrait that people would find readable. Well spoken.

Rather than bitching over articles, reviews and interviews, and rather than blaming the host and producers of The Current for not having verified my sources, the children of Peter and Jennie Gzowski would do well to read the biography, including its 1,000 detailed explanatory endnotes. I guarantee that they will discover a readable, well-researched and balanced portrait of their father, whose stature in the pantheon of Canadian and international broadcasting is in no way diminished by the fact that I discovered a real human being called Peter John Gzowski.

Sincerely,

R.B. Fleming