ABSTRACT
The Holford who returned to Merseyside in 1933 was a much developed version of the young man who had departed less than three years before. The advance in his intellectual and emotional maturity was out of all proportion to the time which he had spent in Rome. During that intervening period he had acquired the experience of original scholarship, some sympathy for the politics of the left and for the new architecture, and the makings of a reputation. His manifest ability was no longer the undifferentiated talent of the bright student, which finds his expression in responding to whatever stimulus it receives, or to whatever programme is set for it. His public stance was now that of one espoused to certain values in architecture, derived from solid study and reflection, which he would soon be in a position to promulgate.
