If there is in English today an heir apparent to the title of reigning man of letters, the mantle of John Lehmann or Stephen Spender, his name is probably Anthony Thwaite. While there are others who have produced a more obviously major body of work in poetry, or who have excelled in a number of genres, there is none who has combined both the scope and seriousness of Thwaite's own poetry with his breadth of experience and authority as an editor. Uniting urbanity with wide interests and sympathies, Thwaite, in his major concerns and in the course his life has taken over the past twenty-five years, takes on a representative quality.

Although born in Chester, Anthony Thwaite attaches more significance to the fact that both sides of his family come from Yorkshire as far back as they can be traced. This, as Thwaite says, is quite far, for...