The Last of England (The Choice of the Poetry Book Society)

iv, 67, [1] pp. "Widely regarded as one of the best 'social' poets now writing in England, he writes of the English, and of what it means to be living in England now, with a sharpness of perception derived in part, perhaps, from the fact that he is an Australian. These poems, which were written between 1967 and 1970, continue the directions and preoccupations of Mr. Porter's earlier books. Increasingly man is seen in a historical as well as a social dimension, but counter-balancing such powerful and ambitious poems as 'Europe' and 'The Widow's Story,' are a group of personal poems and some more of his brilliant translations from Martial, a poet with whom he has much in common."