"Cross-currents" contains forty-two essays written for "Poetry Nation Review" at the invitation of its editor, Michael Schmidt, and published in the magazine as an unbroken series between 1995 and 2003. Some of them chronicle events and issues relating to those years: all have poetry at their centre, while covering a wide range of other subjects. These include film, music and contemporary art: and there are also accounts of visits to Saint Petersburg, Bosnia, the Orkneys and Venice. The essays take their bearings not only from English literature, but also from French, German, American, Czech and Russian writers: the question which runs throughout is the fundamental one of value. The approach is associative and personal; the aim, to present a lively and companionable stimulus to the reader's own thinking.