SOURCE: "The Poetry of Margaret Avison," in Canadian Literature, No. 2, Autumn, 1959, pp. 47-58.

In the following essay, Wilson surveys Avison's poetry, remarking on the poet's themes and style and noting her interest in space and perspective.

For most readers of Canadian poetry, Margaret Avison seems to be less a poet than a kind of negative legend. One of the first critics to mention her in print simply regretted her absence from an anthology; one of the last wondered ironically if she had ever published anything but "The Butterfly". This negative emphasis can be misleading. Miss Avison has published about forty-five poems in the last twenty years, and over half of them have been in Canadian publications. Her total output may be scattered, but it is sizable enough, and certainly substantial.

We hear her called a very intellectual poet, but she begins (and often ends) with the perceiving eye...