For Edward Thomas, Richard Jefferies (1848-87) was more than a nature writer: he was a guiding spirit of the English landscape who affected a profound influence upon Thomas's own writings. From his boyhood days, Thomas regarded Jefferies' The Amateur Poacher (1879) among his favourite books for its eerie capture of 'the free air-open', and as Thomas himself grew into an adept chronicler of the English countryside he would return to his mentor with this astute critical biography. First published in 1909, Richard Jefferies is a subtle account of the nineteenth-century writer's life and an illuminating study of a body of work which Thomas once described as 'a gospel, an incantation'.