James K. Baxter, one of New Zealand's greatest poets, began writing poetry when he was a seven-year-old pupil at Brighton Primary School. By the time his first book, Beyond the Palisades, was published when he was eighteen, he had written more than 600 poems. His life's work, contained in this four-volume set, runs to just over 3000 poems, more than half of which have never before been published. John Weir, a fellow poet, friend and confidant of Baxter, has achieved the Herculean task of sorting these into a coherent order, noting where poems have been reworked or repurposed, their possible inspirations and influences, and Baxter's own thoughts about his work.