SOURCE: “England, Our England,” in Spectator, August 22, 1987, pp. 28-9.

In the following excerpted review, Ingrams offers positive assessment of Forever England.

Last year I took on the task of compiling an anthology about England, since when I have been delving around among my books looking for bits and pieces that might merit inclusion. There are basically two categories. One is the writing of foreign observers like Henry James who see the country from the point of view of a tourist to whom everything is fresh and strange. The other is that of the English themselves—more rewarding from the anthologist's point of view because in writing about England they reveal, if they are any good, the character of the English people.

One conclusion I have reached is that the hallmark of the authentic English writer, to be found on a whole range of authors from Dr Johnson to...