{{Short description|Canadian writer (1943–2025)}} {{Use dmy dates|date=January 2026}} {{Infobox person | birth_date = {{birth date|1943|1|10|df=y}} | birth_place = Barrie, Ontario, Canada | death_date = {{death date and age|df=y|2025|8|13|1943|1|10}} | death_place = St. Catharines, Ontario, Canada | occupation = Writer, poet | known_for = Biographies }} '''Elspeth MacGregor Cameron''' (10 January 1943 – 13 August 2025) was a Canadian writer best known for her biographies of noted Canadian literary figures such as Irving Layton and Earle Birney. She was also noted for her 1997 memoir ''No Previous Experience'', a memoir of her process of self-discovery when, having previously identified as heterosexual, she began to develop a sexual and romantic attraction to historian Janice Dickin McGinnis.<ref>"Out of the closet with a vengeance". ''Waterloo Region Record'', 14 June 1997.</ref> She also published a volume of poetry.
Cameron lived in St. Catharines, Ontario. She taught at Concordia University, the University of Toronto and Brock University. She died in St. Catharines on 13 August 2025, at the age of 82.<ref>{{cite web|title=Biographer Elspeth Cameron told stories of Canadian literary talents and revealed her own secret life|url=https://www.theglobeandmail.com/canada/article-biographer-told-stories-of-canadian-literary-talents-and-revealed-her/|date=8 September 2025|last=Stoffman|first=Judy|publisher=The Globe and Mail|access-date=17 September 2025}}</ref>
==Awards== Her biography of Hugh MacLennan, ''Hugh MacLennan: A Writer's Life'', was nominated for the Governor General's Award for English-language non-fiction at the 1981 Governor General's Awards.<ref>"Gallant's collection of short stories takes fiction prize". ''The Globe and Mail'', 18 May 1982.</ref> ''No Previous Experience'' won the W. O. Mitchell Literary Prize.<ref>"Calgarians are on a roll". ''Calgary Herald'', 18 July 1998.</ref>
==Bibliography== *''Hugh MacLennan: A Writer's Life'' (1981) *''A Spider Danced A Cosy Jig'' (1984) *''Irving Layton: A Portrait'' (1985) *''Robertson Davies: An Appreciation'' (1991) *''Earle Birney: A Life'' (1994) *''Great Dames'' (1997) *''No Previous Experience: A Memoir of Love and Change'' (1997) *''And Beauty Answers: The Life of Frances Loring and Florence Wyle'' (2007) *''Aunt Winnie'' (2013) *A Tale of Two Divas: The Curious Adventures of Jean Forsyth and Edith J. Miller in Canada’s Edwardian West (2017)
==References== {{Reflist}}
==External links== {{Archival records|title=Elspeth Cameron Papers}}
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{{DEFAULTSORT:Cameron, Elspeth}} Category:1943 births Category:2025 deaths <!--Please do not add bisexual categories. She must publicly identify as bisexual in order for it to be added--> Category:20th-century Canadian biographers Category:Canadian women non-fiction writers Category:Canadian people of Scottish descent Category:Canadian LGBTQ writers Category:People from St. Catharines Category:Canadian women biographers Category:Writers from Ontario Category:20th-century Canadian women writers Category:21st-century Canadian biographers Category:21st-century Canadian women writers Category:21st-century Canadian LGBTQ people Category:20th-century Canadian LGBTQ people
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