To enjoy these, you need to be either alarmingly well-read or unintimidated by encountering someone who is much better read than you. I'm in the latter category. The range of reference is huge: from an aged Samurai arranging flowers to an Islamic executioner, from Ancient Greece and Rome to Chuang-tzu, from Western Australian landmarks to scientific and mythopoeic cosmology. And I trusted his references: when he attributed thoughts to La Perouse in the long 'La Perouse to Eleanore', I believed he had immersed himself in La Perouse's writing enough to have got it right. I intend reading this again.