Michael Tolkien was born in Birmingham in 1943, and brought up in rural south Oxfordshire and North Yorkshire. He studied Classics and English at St. Andrews and Oxford, and worked as a secondary school teacher in Rutland. 'He has an adroit eye and ear for descriptions of place. The collection's title poem illustrates his range when he recalls a visit to Castle Howard...Much for me to ponder, enjoy and remember' (Martin Bax: Ambit 199). '...His best poems...do something both original and informed by the tradition he loves: they are visually and aurally satisfying...there are unmissable poems...

Woodsies can take on any human shape, and have appeared in larger and finer forms than we can ever hope to have, though mostly they just need well-disguised bodies strong enough to care for plants that like wood-filtered light. They are mainly practical, wise, and helpful, but all families have misfits and trouble-makers and sometimes young woodsies like Leaf-lag won't grow up and have to learn the hard way.
This rebellious, 'ne'er-dowell' woodsy only half listens to his lessons and training, and after idling his way through summer is frightened to face a season of work to make up for...