His adherence to the principle of the open mind kept him from limiting himself to any one of these perspectives.
Though strongly influenced by H. G. Wells, Beresford was no mere imitator; his empirical approach to the minute details of human existence was modified by his idealism, mysticism, and probing of the psyche. He was one of the first and most knowledgeable of English novelists to explore in his fiction the new dynamic psychologies of William James, F. W. H. Myers, Henri Bergson, Sigmund Freud, and Carl Jung. His God's Counterpoint (1918) represents an early foray into the explicitly psychoanalytic novel. In several critical essays Beresford articulated more clearly than his contemporaries the strengths and limitations of the use of the new psychology in fiction. His second novel, The Hampdenshire Wonder (1911), now considered a classic of fantasy literature, initiated his role as critic of English society, a role he continued both in sociological novels and in the seven subsequent futuristic and fantasy novels, all of which remain relevant. Beresford's biography also deserves study, as he established friendships and exchanged ideas with Lawrence, Walter de la Mare, John Middleton Murry, and Katherine Mansfield.
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