It is a miraculous task that Eavan Boland set for herself in The Historians: nothing less than the redefining of both history and poetry as ongoing individual consciousness transforming into artistic process. In the book's first poem, 'The Fire Gilder, ' this process occurs before the reader's eyes, posited as an artist mother's love of silver and gold, 'one was volatile, one was not.' In exact phenomenal mimicry, Boland demonstrates how memory is separated from knowledge (one volatile, the other not). Each poem is a revelation of a past made new and a present equal in the accuracy of eloquent regard. This book is alive as a legacy for all readers–and for the future where Eavan Boland's greatness will endure.–Carol Muske-Dukes