Undiscovered Countryis filled with soulful accomplished writing in a variety of lyrical modes, including the long poem. When someone we love dies, what we miss are their presences and particulars. In this new book Rempel journeys through the grieving process, exploring death and loss, and the "dark night of the soul"; through the filters of the geographies and seasons of northern BC. What he finds is an "undiscovered country." Even the bright clouds in spring or the colours of fall, or an afternoon with his daughter, offer an opportunity for the poet to contemplate his existence and rework his worldview. In this new country, he finds a measure of hope, even in the darkest night; like a moon, illuminating a road by the river.

No previous anthology has succeeded in illustrating so thoroughly the kinds of verse actually written in the eighteenth century. The familiar tradition is fully represented by selections from such poets as Pope, Swift, Tomson, Gray, Smart, Goldsmith, Cowper, Burns, and Blake. In addition, the anthology includes verse by many forgotten writers, both men and women, from all levels of society. Although they have never figured in conventional literary history, they wrote humorous, idiosyncratic, and graphic verse about their personal experience and the world around them, in a way that should challenge received ideas about the period's restraints and inhibitions.