This book incorporates a great deal of original research and selected critical commentary about its subject . In the course of doing so, it identifies the intense level of peer-to-peer networking amongst most of the literary figures of Nicholson’s era in England. The associated  ‘tag cloud’ link illustrates this point; it is scaled according to frequency of mentions in the text of Boyd’s book of the various members of these networks, as well as those from the past who influenced and inspired them, such as Shakespeare and Wordsworth. Perhaps obviously, T.S. Eliot features very prominently, but Boyd’s study also includes consideration of Nicholson’s far lesser-researched contacts such as Michael and Janet Roberts, George Every and Charles Williams. Their involvement in the remarkable outreach project from the church of St. Anne’s in the heart of London’s Soho is also uncovered by this book. It is thus by no means solely ‘about’ Norman Nicholson, but about the whole of the literary scene in England during the second half of the 20th century.
Nicholson’s poetry in its day drew considerable critical acclaim, although reviewers’ opinions tended to be polarised, his style of poetry being idiosyncratic and by no means following modernist fashions. The book also seeks to re-appraise the standing of Nicholson’s poetry and other works now that adequate critical distance has been travelled since his death. Additionally, the author seeks reasons for Nicholson’s current unfashionable status and his apparent failure fully to live up to his former great promise as an Eliot-endorsed ‘Faber Poet’.
Boyd’s study will therefore be a significant and indispensable addition to English Literature faculties and their academic libraries worldwide.