I’ll miss Rex
Loss of Murphy’s scrutiny a blow to our politics
Ifirst met Robert Rex Rafael Murphy (b. 1947) almost five years ago, when he interviewed me for REXTV, his podcast. This was at a time when no mainstream journalists — although Rex was hardly mainstream — would do so, given my essentially reprehensible nature and proclivity to actually say what almost everyone with any sense knew to be true. He was extremely fair and even-handed in his questions, just as you would hope a true seeker after what was genuine and real to be — but he was also far more than that. Rex Murphy was a man whose integrity and commitment to the uphill path was evident in every glance and utterance. He had the sharp visage and the gimlet eye of a bird of prey, although he was also kind and compassionate in exactly the manner that characterizes those who are truly good. Like other good people, in consequence, he saved his proclivity to extend a hand of care to the people who actually needed it, instead of waving his good-thinking proudly in the air like a banner of publicly-declared virtue.
The time surrounding our first meeting is a bit blurred in my memory, as I was very ill when the interview occurred, and I do not remember what Rex and I did next to continue our relationship. I think maybe he came for dinner with my wife Tammy and son and daughter-in-law Julian and Jill and their little kids, as he did a number of times. In any case, however, we began to see more of each other, socially, and at public events and conferences. We shared a small-town rural origin, a history of intellectual endeavour on the literary side, and the sharp sense of satirical humour that characterizes both Newfoundland and Alberta. This enabled us to embark on what developed into a true friendship.
I returned the podcast favour to him six times, the last time less than a year ago. We mostly discussed the increasingly sorry state of Canada under our increasingly sorry excuse for a prime minister, the Right Honourable Justin Trudeau — perhaps the least qualified and most self-aggrandizing of all those who have held that position. We travelled together during the Canadian leg of my Beyond Order tour, which brought the contents of my second popular book before a host of live audiences. I was privileged to have him as the opener for a number of those events, and as the interlocutor for the question period that followed.
Had Rex not had a genius for the pen, and the capacity for political analysis of the most astute kind, he could have been a highly successful and much-touted stand-up comedian. His 10-minute intro always had the audience in stitches. Woe betide the politician upon whom the ruthless stare of Rex Murphy fell. He was the kind of man who saw exactly what was plain for all to see, and was unforgiving in his proclivity to point all that obviousness out to the men and women who refuse to acknowledge the blinding beams obscuring their own vision.
Tammy and I also travelled with Rex to Newfoundland for five great days. We did this with the expert documentary crew from the American news and entertainment organization Daily Wire Plus, who will release the results in the very near future, for all Canadians and all those interested elsewhere to watch and enjoy. He warned us beforehand of the high likelihood of the terrible weather that stony island is known for, but we had nearly a week of straight sun. There was even a heat warning issued in St. John’s at the time of our visit — an event unprecedented in his or his fellow islanders’ memory. Rex joked about that the whole time, cursing us for our good fortune — and he was an excellent hand at a curse. What a remarkable time that was! Both my wife and I had like all Canadians of our generation and older known of Mr. Murphy for pretty much our whole lives, particularly as a consequence of his decades of work on CBC radio and then on TV on The National, where he spent years as a commentator and kept the whole bloody show afloat. We could not believe our luck: a guided tour of the ports and towns of Newfoundland, that hidden gem, with none other than the man whom anyone with any sense would most devoutly hope for as a guide! Perhaps everyone will enjoy the trip as much as we did when it is released.
Turning the camera on Rex, as we did so often that week, was a continual treat. He was a deeply educated man, a master of the humanities, and had memorized far more poetry than most other educated men had read. This gave his speech a gravitas, cadence and rhythm that was shocking in its quality. What would the world be like if everyone learned to speak in such a manner! Every word he said, every phrase that came rolling out of his lips, every sentence he allowed his internal muse to craft was a masterpiece of intonation, connotation, and styling. He had been a debating champion at Oxford, in his youth, and his way with words was something truly admirable and remarkable to behold. I have had the opportunity to meet many stellar people in my life — some remarkable speakers among them — but no one with a greater capacity for spontaneous verbal verse like the redoubtable Mr. Murphy.
Rex was also a man of true humility, and not of the fake butter-will-not-melt-in-my mouth variety that too often typifies the famous striving a bit too hard and unbelievably to stay on the ground. Rex treated everyone well, and had great respect for the hard-toiling working class people who made up his family of origin, as well as the extended family of Canadians who were his admirers and fans. There was always a roar of approval when Rex hit the stage in his unexpected and unannounced appearances at my lectures. Most so-called ordinary Canadians have the sense to distinguish the real from the false — although they can be fooled by the odd true charlatan of charm and style — and Mr. Murphy was real right to the core.
He was exactly the kind of star that the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation was set up, in principle, to produce — a genuine Canuck voice, a celebrity of the truly Canadian type, not flashy like the movie stars and talking heads of our American neighbours, with their Hollywood glitz, but sane and solid and clear-headed and honest and charismatic for all those reasons. There could have been more of his sort, in principle, if our national broadcaster had managed the courage of its hypothetical convictions. That was the point of the enterprise, after all. And how was he treated at that oh-so-elite and pretentious organization? His work was seldom promoted — virtually never, if truth be told. And his reward, at the end of what was perhaps the most illustrious career in the history of our long serving and immensely self-aggrandizing public broadcaster? A gift certificate for Tim Hortons, left on his desk to commemorate his retirement.
This was a great comic story, as he told it — and that was the true gift left for him when he left that dismal and self-satisfied corporate world. I don’t know if Rex would appreciate me sharing it, private as he was, very much disinclined to complain. There is something in it, however, that increasingly typifies Canada itself, as it comes guiltily unwound — something in my opinion that cries out to be shared. Rex was a giant of character and conduct in a country that is uneasy with giants, regarding them, somehow, as unseemly, uncanadian in its deviation from beige mediocrity and littleness that we parade as a moral virtue, in contrast to the drama of noisy success characterizing our American allies. He therefore raised the ire — or, more accurately, the petty jealousy and envy — of the little men and women who depended upon him for whatever success came their way, but who were unwilling to note and be grateful for the source of its delivery.
Rex was, finally, a lonely figure. He did not become a member of the pack of political acolytes that the press who cover the politicians so often join, enticed by their nearness to the power they so often crave for themselves; enticed in that manner to become the friends, allies or even promoters of those whose feet they are supposed to hold to the flame. He stayed aloof — not for reasons of arrogance, or even introversion, although he was essentially a solitary person — and he did so to ensure that his detachment and professional eye remained intact. He did so to deliver to the country for which he felt an immense and proper patriotism the truth it so desperately both needed and wanted. It was all the more a privilege, in consequence of those personal and professional proclivities, to be let in somewhat closely to the inner circle of his thoughts.
I will miss him immensely, as will my wife and as will all the Canadians for whom Rex was a necessary and salutary voice — a much better voice than our own, witty, cutting, challenging, sharp-tongued but never casually mean, striving to clarify and to learn, calling to order those would-be leaders who let their own pride and wilful blindness get the better of them. The CBC is a desert wasteland without Rex Murphy. Our already blighted political landscape will in general be much more barren without his careful attention. Who could we possibly find to replace him — that man of tremendous charm, erudition, humility, perfect comic timing, sardonic and rapier wit, serpentine gaze, and the gentleness of a dove? Rex had a spine of titanium, the courage of a soldier, the respect for competence of the man of true humility, and the respect for words of the man who knows the value of genius, culture and tradition. He was a product of the hard times that made his home island and this country great, to the degree that it has every managed greatness. He was a man who made his way on the sheer grounds of merit that are so much denied today, in concert with the action of his iron determination and will. He was someone who showed us all what someone everyone was proud to call a Canadian could most truly be. We will all be much less with him gone; I will be much less, personally. It was a great honour to be someone he called a friend. I am very sad indeed that he has shuffled off this mortal coil.
REX WAS A GIANT OF CHARACTER AND CONDUCT IN A COUNTRY THAT IS UNEASY WITH GIANTS.