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In this short book Norman Holland is concerned with the effects of personality on reading and writing, in particular on Hilda Doolittle's writing of her own poetry and on the readers' responses to it. Drawing from the work of Robert Waelder on the ego and from that of Heinz Lichtenstein on the organic unity of the psyche, Holland seeks the “identity themes” (style of interacting or “character”) of the poetess (known as H.D.) and of particular readers of her poetry. He believes that knowledge of these identity themes clarifies the relationship of H.D.'s life to her poems and the readers' experiences of them.
In the first chapter, “A Maker's Mind,” Holland uses H.D.'s account of her analysis with Freud (Tribute to Freud) to infer her identity theme. He focuses on the transferential relationships, especially the one in which Freud's role is the cosmic, nurturing mother of earliest infancy, and concludes that it is H.D.'s wish and fear to close the gap between herself and her mother which color her future development and her writings. In Holland's words, H.D.'s identity theme is “to close the gap between inner and outer, spiritual and physical, male and female, by perfect, timeless signs which she can be and be in.” Or, in short, “to close the gap with signs.” Having established her identity theme, Holland then shows its relation to her poetry. For instance, her concern with the boundaries between herself and another (ultimately her mother) is related to her “choppy stanza forms” and “her difficulties with the boundaries of sentences.” Likewise, her part in the