As [F. R.] Scott pointed out in the preface to New Provinces, the onset of the economic depression of 1929–1936 provided the young experimental writers of the twenties with a subject matter. This was certainly true in Scott's own case. He quickly arrived at the conclusion that the depression marked the breakdown of the capitalist system and that capitalism must be replaced by socialism. (p. 230)

It was not long before these socialist convictions began to appear in Scott's poetry. For the first few years they appeared negatively, in the form of satire at the expense of the waste, inhumanity, and humbug of a decadent capitalist society…. [The] full force of Scott's satiric attack on capitalism vented itself in a group of sixteen poems published in the Forum of May, 1932, under the joint title "An Anthology of Up-to-date Canadian Poetry."… Sympathy for the unemployed, the poor, and the sick had...