Arquivo F1010 - Glen Shortliffe fonds

Glen Shortliffe was born in 1913 at Stonewall, Manitoba. He went to school and university in Edmonton, graduating with a B.A. and an M.A. from the University of Alberta, his M.A. thesis being entitled "Les idees des philosophes dans les contes de Voltaire". He spent the year 1935-1936 at the Sorbonne on a French Government Scholarship and then entered Cornell University to undertake graduate work. He received his Ph.D. for a thesis on "Le roman social avant le naturalisme" and was elected to three honorary graduate fraternities.

Glen Shortliffe entered the French Department at Queen’s in September 1939 where he made his mark as a teacher and a scholar. His academic interests in the early part of his career were in nineteenth-century French literature and in the practical aspects of modern language teaching. He embraced the possibilities offered by the newly invented tape recorder and built up a language laboratory at Queen's. He actually had a hand in constructing the booths and wiring the whole system, For a time Shortliffe was also Editor of the Queen's Quarterly and Director of the Summer School of English.

Shortliffe passed away at the early age of 56, in 1969.