F. R. Scott was one of the most important catalysts of modern English-Canadian poetry, partly because of the influence of his own poetry and partly because of a charismatic personality: he was instrumental in the founding of several literary groups and little magazines such as the McGill Fortnightly Review, the Canadian Mercury, and Preview. He was also a pioneer translator of Quebecois poetry. As a satirist in the late 1920s and early 1930s, he helped battle an outworn romanticism in order to introduce the new poetry. In such landscape poems as "Old Song," "Lakeshore," and "Laurentian Shield," he established a northern evolutionary view of Canadian nature which influenced contemporary poets, including Earle Birney, Al Purdy, and Margaret Atwood. As a commentator on the wider field of Canadian culture, F. R. Scott is a figure of extraordinary importance. He achieved distinction not only as a poet but also as...