This short introduction to the work of an essentially modern writer includes four curious poems apparently suppressed from the first edition and reprints of the Raoul Dufy woodcuts published in the 1911 edition.

X. J. Kennedy has written poetry, children's verse, and fiction as well as textbooks on writing and literature. Before becoming a full-time writer, he taught at the University of Michigan, the University of North Carolina-Greensboro, Tufts University, Wellesley College, the University of California-Irvine, and the University of Leeds. He now lives in Lexington, Massachusetts, with his wife and sometime coauthor, Dorothy M. Kennedy.