The dedication copy. Maurice Bowra's study of one of the oldest forms of poetry, the narrative poem, inscribed by him to Isaiah Berlin. The two were both deemed legendary figures at Oxford during their long tenures there. In his 1980 publication Personal Impressions, Berlin dedicated an entire chapter to his friend Bowra and described his love of life and the classical world:

'He loved the sun, the sea, the warmth, light, and hated the cold and darkness, physical and intellectual, moral, political. All his life he liked freedom, individuality, independence, and detested everything that seemed to him to cramp and constrict the forces of human vitality[...] His passion for the Mediterranean and its cultures was of a piece with this: he loved pleasure, exuberance, the richest fruits of nature and civilisation, the fullest expression of human feeling, uninhibited by a Machinean sense of guilt. Consequently he had little sympathy for those who recoiled from the forces of life - cautious, calculating conformists, or those who seemed to him prigs or prudes who winced at high vitality or passion, and were too easily shocked by vehemence and candour.'

Bowra had a powerful influence on Berlin and a very deep and lifelong friendship resulted. Berlin, however, admitted that 'I did love him much more - towards the end - than I respected him'.

First edition; 8vo; the dedication copy, inscribed on the front free endpaper, 'Isaiah from Maurice'; red cloth with gilt title to spine, with the original dust jacket, spine faded, minor stains to back, a very good copy.