Ivor John Carnegie Brown

Ivor John Carnegie Brown (born in 1891) is a British journalist and politician, currently in exile in Canada.

Ivor Brown was born in 1891 in Penang (at that time part of the British Malaysia and now in Siam), the younger of two sons of Scottish parents. He wrote and illustrated his first book at age five, showing even at such an early age a remarkable passion for writing.

Brown attended Balliol College, Oxford, and graduated with double degrees in Classics and Literae Humaniores. He spent two days as a civil servant in the Home Office in 1913 before realising he was unsuited for the job. When the Weltkrieg broke out he conscientiously objected and remained at home.

He became involved in progressive politics and in 1916 he married theatre director Irene Hentschel. He also embraced a career in journalism and in the 1919 he started writing for the Manchester Guardian. His writing included editorials and sports criticism but drama criticism was his speciality.

When the British Revolution broke out he fled to Canada with his family and he settled in Toronto. At first, deeply embittered by the Syndicalist revolution that caused his flight, he started writing for the conservative newspaper The Mail and Empire. However, after a few years he rejected the harsh and bitter tones of the conservatives and embraced more liberal views and from 1929 he started writing for the Toronto Star.