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departure from what had come to be acceptedas typical of this writer. It is particularly interestingbecause it contains twenty-eight poemshitherto unpublished, under the collective titleof The Forest. These take us a step furtheralong the very personal road of Judith Wright'spoetry. They are distinguished by the same certaintyof language and techniques we havecome to expect. The title-poem of this series,although there are many excellent and diversepoems here, seems to me to crystallize simplyand unpretentiously the nature of her quest. Iquote it in full:When first I knew this forestits flowers were strange.Their different forms and faceschanged with the seasons' change—white violets smudged with purple,the wild-ginger spray,ground-orchids small and singlehaunted my day.the thick-fleshed Murray-lily,flame-tree's bright blood,and where the creek runs shallow,the cunjevoi's green hood.When first I knew this forest,time was to spend,and time's renewing harvestcould never reach an end.Now that its vines and flowersare named and known,like long-fulfilled desiresthose first strange joys are gone.My search is further.There's still to name and knowbeyond the flowers I gatherthat one that does not wither—the truth from which they grow.It is a remarkable poem, less complex thanmany she has written, yet summarizing, Iwould suggest, her whole poetic endeavour.The vines and flowers, the familiar things oflife whether of nature or of man, are namedand known. From time to time she will returnto them, but not merely to identify or describe.Henceforth the search is further: to "the truthfrom which they grow". In this single poem wesee her moving, as the whole of her poeticwork has moved, from the regional to theuniversal.And now, at last, having attempted to distilthe essence of her writing, let us now look ather latest collection, The Other Half (1966).The concluding piece, "Turning Fifty", remindsus that the poet is now no longer young,no longer the "woman of thirty-five" whosework, on the evidence of two pubUshed volumes,H. M. Green found "amazing"." Atfifty she reviews the times through which shehas lived:Though we've pollutedeven this air I breatheand spoiled green earth;though, granted fife or death,death's what we're choosing,and though these years we fivescar flesh and mind,still, as the sun comes up,bearing my birthday,having met time and loveI raise my cup—dark, bitter, neutral, clean,sober as morning—to all I've seen and known—to this new sun.Poems written to celebrate one's own birthdayare seldom memorable and this is no exception.It is nevertheless impressive in itshomely sincerity. This is a coffee cup she israising, not a convivial glass, and it is clearthat she is still possessed by the doubts andfears which were the main theme of The TwoFires. So much profound writing, so muchword magic and control, so much that hasbeen accepted as the best of contemporaryAustralian poetry—all this stems from awoman, now turned fifty, greeting "the newsun" with courage undimmed and, as oneknows from what she has already produced,equipped while strength remains with her tocontinue her quest of ultimate truth.The themes she has chosen for this latestvolume are varied, but there is this recurringnote of age, accompanied by a somewhat wistfulnote of the inevitability of change that agebrings. Among the poems in The Forest serieswas one, "For My Daughter", which reviewedthe problem of the woman who is also amother, her child grown up and going herseparate way:My body gave you thenwhat was ordained to give,and did not need my will.But now we learn to liveapart, what must I do?"The Curtain", describing the homecomingof a grown child, continues this thought:WESTERLY, No. 1, MARCH, 1968 49