SOURCE: "Tomlinson, Ruskin, and Moore: Facts and Fir Trees," in Twentieth-Century Literature, Vol. 35, No. 2, Summer, 1989, pp. 183-94.

In the following essay, Grogan discusses John Ruskin's influence on Tomlinson, especially the attention to detail and faithfulness to visual surfaces.

Charles Tomlinson is undoubtedly one of England's most distinguished living poets and critics. The accumulated work of four decades—his Collected Poems published by Oxford in 1985, his many translations (from Vallejo, Tyutchev, Machado, and Paz, to name only a few), his large body of criticism and memoirs, his exhibitions of graphic work and the three resulting volumes of reproductions—has been accompanied by honors, prizes, and invitations to read and lecture in many countries. As a poet and artist deeply rooted in his native England, and at the same time an internationalist and multilinguist, he lays claim to our closest attention.

Tomlinson has frequently cited John Ruskin, that most English...