In William Blissett's masterful study The Porpoise and the Otter, we encounter dapper, choosy Max Beerbohm (1872-1956) and the massive untidy G. K. Chesterton (1874-1936), together again in the great age of verbal parody, penetrating caricature, and the writer as personality. In considering their life and works, Professor Blissett discloses a host of new details bearing on how the two essayist-cartoonists viewed their Edwardian world with its roots in Victorian grandeur and facing a troubled new century.

Inward of Poetry presents fifty years of thoughtful and, by turns, chatty letters between poet George Johnston and his good friend and frequent editor, the scholar William Blissett. Edited by former student Sean Kane, this lively collection includes several hitherto unpublished Johnston poems and reveals the development and creative necessities of one of Canada's revered poets and translators.