Insights from the old and new literatures of several countries jostle for space in this work - not to mention aesthetics, musicology, mythology, philosophy, poetry, politics, and psychology. The subjects, even when unsympathetic in themselves, are viewed in the round, and judged with humanity. Yet Martin also has a strong moral impulse, as evidenced by the title of this collection. So although he can roam as far back temporally as Perkin Warbeck, and into magical regions with Orpheus, we see in his work a frequent return to more recent periods, and a nagging anxiety to explain why and how...