At 77, Christopher Plummer, world famous actor and sometime Ottawan, has lost none of his appreciation of the anarchic impulses of youth.

The great actor was given an honorary doctorate Sunday at the convocation of the University of Ottawa at the National Arts Centre.

When David Staines, chairman of the department of music, made the introduction, the list of accolades and famous performances was dauntingly long.

The Broadway performances - and Mr. Plummer has done many, in the process earning more Tony nominations than any other actor - included The Lark, with Julie Harris; the title role in Anthony Burgess's musical Cyrano; and just this year, the role of Henry Drummond in Inherit the Wind.

He has performed brilliantly on the stages of London.

And there have been more than 100 film roles, most famously that of Captain Georg von Trapp in The Sound of Music.

In summary, Mr. Staines described him as "a performer of the highest order, a man who's touched the hearts and souls of millions around the world with his incomparable talent as an actor."

He may be full of honours and full of days, but Mr. Plummer certainly proved anything but full of himself.

Here came the sympathy with youthful anarchic enthusiasm: "You've powered your way out," he told the assembled young graduates with congratulatory fervour. "You've escaped at last."

The hundreds of young graduates roared with laughter.

"I understand escapes," Mr. Plummer said. "Escapes are a long habit of mine. I managed to escape the womb - and what a challenge that was."

His own escape, in youth, was reading, he went on to say.

"Before the long Cyclops eye of television and the Net had dared insinuate themselves into our lives - I'm such a dinosaur, I'm still staggered by the invention of the radio! - you read. You spent your nights reading."

The world of literature became real to him.

"I was never lonely, for the characters I met in books became my closest friends."

If books offered escape, it was "only natural that I chose a profession that offered the greatest escape of them all - the world's second-oldest profession," he said to laughter. "But better paid than the first," he added.

He said the stage "has been, since the beginning of man, a platform for ideas, a place upon which to explore the human condition."

Like literature, the stage "doesn't regurgitate life, but it intensifies it, surpasses it."

He had begun his career here in Ottawa, on the stages of the LaSalle Academy, then on Gigues Street, the only professional theatre in English Canada at the time and the cradle of such other eminent actors as William Shatner and John Colicos. That was back in 1948, when he was 18.

"And from the LaSalle Academy down on Gigues Street to all the stages of the world, the most sublime roles ever written by man can be prepared by giving them the breath of life," he said.

Only by escaping from the familiar can one come to know anything of the world, he said, quoting George Bernard Shaw's pithy presentation of the dilemma of those who do not venture: "I didn't know my house because I'd never been outside it."

So the graduates' imminent escape was a wonderful thing, he said. And not only for them.

"Being here today, you've made me feel that my years have fallen away, and I'm with you, sitting out there, impatient, waiting for the party to begin.

"So throw all caution to the wind, storm the Bastille - but for God's sake, wait for me - because I'm coming with you!"

With those words, this man whose reading of the phone book could lead legions up ant hills, got a final standing ovation.

Earlier in the day, another eminent Canadian also received an honorary doctorate. Financial magnate Stephen Jarislowsky, a philanthropist and good governance advocate who lives in Montreal, received the honour in the morning. The Jarislowsky Foundation funds literacy, the fine arts, and the endowment of numerous university research chairs across Canada.

More than 1,370 graduates received their diplomas Sunday, including Tracey Dee Lindberg, who is believed to be the first aboriginal woman to get a PhD in Law from a Canadian University.

She was also awarded the Governor General's Gold Medal in the Humanities, awarded to the most outstanding doctoral degree recipient in the humanities and social sciences.

L'acteur canadien Christopher Plummer s'est vu décerner, hier, un doctorat honorifique de l'Université d'Ottawa, lors de la Collation des grades automnale de l'université, tenue au Centre national des Arts. Plus de 1 370 étudiants y ont également reçu leur diplôme.

L'homme de théâtre, qui est né à Toronto et qui a grandi à Montréal, a commencé sa carrière à Ottawa en 1948. Il a récemment joué dans Syriana, au côté de George Clooney.

Le directeur du Département de musique de l'Université d'Ottawa, David Staines, a présenté M. Plummer comme un comédien canadien ayant conquis les plus hauts sommets de son art, de Broadway à Londres, en passant par Hollywood. "Il est la personne vivante ayant été nominée le plus souvent pour un prix Tony, la plus importante récompense annuelle pour le théâtre", a souligné M. Staines.

Au début de son allocution, présentée en français et en anglais, M. Plummer a souhaité un bon voyage aux jeunes diplômés. "Là, vous n'avez qu'une idée en tête : fuir ! Vous êtes enfin libres. Félicitations, chers détenus !"

Sur le même ton, l'acteur a dit que deux des événements les plus marquants de sa vie s'étaient déroulés à Ottawa : "J'y ai choisi de devenir acteur et j'y ai perdu ma virginité !", a-t-il déclaré, devant une foule composée de jeunes diplômés, hilares. "J'ai toujours aimé lire, alors c'est tout naturel que je me sois tourné vers le théâtre", a-t-il indiqué. "Il s'agit du deuxième plus vieux métier du monde, et nous y sommes nus comme le jour où nous sommes nés. L'art s'est transformé à travers le temps, mais le théâtre reste."

Parmi les étudiants ayant reçu leurs diplômes, on comptait Tracey Dee Lindberg, qui serait, selon l'Université d'Ottawa, la première femme autochtone canadienne à recevoir un doctorat en droit d'une université canadienne. Mme Lindberg deviendra professeure à l'Université d'Ottawa dès janvier.

porfali@ledroit.com