More than Eliot or Pound, the career of Scottish poet Hugh MacDiarmid reflects the restless nature of the modern age. This study attempts, in his own phrase, to "circumjack" or "fully explicate" a troubling but brilliant author. Examining his earliest work, Herbert posits a symbolic structure that governs all MacDiarmid's periods, as well as explaining his need for ceaseless change. MacDiarmid emerges as a modernist of international stature, but also...