"I found the tone of the book singularly attractive. It is highly individual yet profoundly modest; it has an unusual, slightly angular candour, full of painful knowledge and a beautiful humanity; it couldn't be pretentious if it tried... [E]ven the slightest piece bears the mark of his rare, austere mind, his remarkable imagination... Even these occasional essays are enough to remind us that, on his day, there is not, at the moment, a writer to touch him."