SOURCE: Frye, Northrop. Review of David and Other Poems. The Canadian Forum 22, no. 263 (December 1942): 278.

In the following review, Frye offers a positive review of Birney's first published collection of poetry.

This is a book [David and Other Poems] for those interested in Canadian poetry to buy and for those interested in complaining that we haven't got any to ignore. Anyone who follows Canadian verse at all closely will be very pleased to see Mr. Birney's fugitive pieces gathered into one volume, and anyone who read the title poem when it first appeared in the Forum will be keenly interested in finding it again in a published book as part of a larger collection.

The people who are familiar with the conventions of modern poetry, who can grasp its difficult language and place its recondite illusions, now form a specialized cult largely confined to universities. “David” will get the...