Canadian icon Tomson Highway to receive honorary degree from Algonquin College

Posted on Wednesday, May 29th, 2024

“I learned to appreciate life early because death was a possibility,” said Tomson Highway. His gratitude is evident in his prolific body of work.headshot of Tomson Highway An impressive wordsmith, Highway is an author, playwright, novelist, songwriter and musician who has enhanced the Canadian literary, music and arts scene for decades.
Highway was born in tent during a cold December winter as the 11th of 12 children to loving parents. He grew up trapping and fishing and living off the land until he was six years old, when he recalls being put on a pontoon plane with his younger brother and sent to residential school.
“He put us very proudly on the plane,” Highway recalled of his father. “He didn’t want us to be illiterate. He could see the social revolution coming and he didn’t want us to be unprepared.”

“I was so proud to change the world for him,” Highway said fondly describing the memory. “He said you go out there and give them hell. I’ve changed the world in my own way. I got an extraordinary education. I worked very hard and everything I did was for my father.”

He recalled receiving a good education from the Jesuits, learning Latin and having a warm bed with white cotton sheets and hot meals. He also remembered summers at home near the northern Manitoba, Saskatchewan, Nunavut border, which he described as “extraordinary.”

“We were pushed out of the nest so young, we had to learn to fly,” said Highway. “By the time you are my age (72), you have developed enormous wings and turn disasters into victories and special experiences.”

Over the years, Highway has been on the world stage and as a passionate participant and observer. “I’ve been to 65 countries,” he shared proudly. “I speak seven languages. I’ve got an extraordinary education. I consider education a gift.”

When asked what advice he has for graduates he said “whatever you do, do it with joy. God put us on the planet to laugh. If you haven’t laughed 100 times in a day, you haven’t lived that day.”

He believed that “developing understanding of other people makes an ideal leader” and he encouraged people to “listen respectfully.”

Highway’s motivation in life could not be simpler. Love, he said, is what motivates him. “I love everybody. I jump out of bed, I enjoy my food, I love my partner, grandchildren, family.”

With accolades, honors and awards that number in the double digits, Highway is most proud of his ability to laugh. “I think everything is amusing. My favourite sound is the sound of human laughter. A person is at their most beautiful when they laugh,” he said. “I have to hear laughter every day. Every bone in my body I have developed to make a joke. I do it so I can hear you laugh. There is nothing uglier than a scowl.”

In the age where education has a major focus on STEM related subjects, Highway maintained the importance of the arts. “I look at a medical doctor who takes care of the human body. Medical science takes care of physical health and the arts deal with the human spirit. You have to have a healthy spirit. The arts are a different kind of science, and they have healing agents like laughter, love and emotion. I’m in the business of creating beauty. Artistic disciplines are just as important.”


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