The suggestion that there should be a selection of this magnitude from Scrutiny came from the Cambridge University Press. It is not offered as a representative anthology; that was never in question. The idea was that the nineteen volumes contained many things that it might be well to make more accessible; that is, both more easy to turn up than when dispersed through some thousands of pages in the original seventy-six quarterly numbers, and, at the same time, purchasable for a smaller outlay. Work generally current because, since its appearance in Scrutiny, incorporated in well-known books, was to be excluded.

This consideration eliminated the main body of criticism of French literature Scrutiny had printed—an elimination that, since there seemed no point in a selection from the miscellaneous little that was left, became total. Again, the exclusion of Wilfred Mellers meant the exclusion of music criticism, and the exclusion of the main body of D. J. Enright's work the exclusion of the criticism of German literature. It was easy, then, to arrive at the decision that these two volumes were to be confined to criticism of English literature, with the addition of some matter of closely related interest. Even so, the reader should be reminded—though it is perhaps hardly necessary—how much Marius Bewley, D. W. Harding, L. C. Knights, John Speirs and D. A. Traversi counted for in the critical influence of Scrutiny: by reason of the well-known books, it couldn't be suggested in the selection.