Early Years
Vanier is the son of the 19th Governor General of Canada, Major-General Georges Vanier and was born in Geneva, while his father was on diplomatic service in Switzerland. In his youth and during World War II he served with the Royal Navy and then with the Royal Canadian Navy. As a midshipman, Vanier accompanied the Royal Family on their tour of South Africa aboard HMS Vanguard in 1947.
From 1950, Vanier travelled to Paris, France to study as an undergraduate. He eventually went on to complete a PhD in philosophy from the Institut Catholique de Paris, with a doctoral thesis on Aristotle. He subsequently taught philosophy at the University of Toronto.
Read more about this topic: Jean Vanier
Famous quotes containing the words early years, early and/or years:
“If there is a price to pay for the privilege of spending the early years of child rearing in the driver’s seat, it is our reluctance, our inability, to tolerate being demoted to the backseat. Spurred by our success in programming our children during the preschool years, we may find it difficult to forgo in later states the level of control that once afforded us so much satisfaction.”
—Melinda M. Marshall (20th century)
“We have been told over and over about the importance of bonding to our children. Rarely do we hear about the skill of letting go, or, as one parent said, “that we raise our children to leave us.” Early childhood, as our kids gain skills and eagerly want some distance from us, is a time to build a kind of adult-child balance which permits both of us room.”
—Joan Sheingold Ditzion (20th century)
“Chrome: her pretty childface smooth as steel, with eyes that would have been at home at the bottom of some deep Atlantic trench, cold gray eyes that lived under terrible pressure. They say she cooked her own cancers for people who crossed her, rococo custom variations that took years to kill you.”
—William Gibson (b. 1948)