Over the past decade Kroetsch has rather quickly established himself as a novelist of significance, but it is as a poet that he has chosen to explore the ancestry of his own imagination.

In such novels as Badlands, Gone Indian, and The Studhorse Man Kroetsch has rummaged in the boneyards of western history and culture in search of the myths that make us real. In The Ledger the quest is more personal…. But the poem is not a simple record of search. What we get here is the poet watching himself search, watching himself write, and finding some pleasure in the irony of his self-regarding posture….

Like all good seekers the poet collects the artifacts and documents of the past. The book contains maps, pages from a ledger, newspaper reports, dictionary definitions, even a letter from the poet's aunt. It is the ledger, however, the daily record of...