In the quotation above Henderson defends the perceived turn in his creative efforts away from the art-poetry of his Elegies for the Dead in Cyrenaica (1948) and towards folk-song. By this time Henderson was established as a central figure in the Scottish folk revival: collecting, cataloguing and disseminating Scottish folk culture; tracing the byways of the oral tradition; profiling the songs and tale-types of regions and peoples; and reinvesting in the ‘carrying stream’ of this tradition through his own songs. Besides the Elegies, his poetry was not well known and had only appeared as scattered contributions to literary magazines. Henderson's exclusion from the Honour'd Shade (1959), an anthology of new Scottish poetry published to mark the bicentenary of the birth of Burns, was noted by a reviewer for The Scotsman, and became part of the ensuing debate in the opinion columns. Henderson, and the other poets who were positioned outside the Rose Street circle presented a challenge to the editorial stance of the collection.

The debate questioned how literary value should be determined and how the ‘best’ of Scottish poetry should be represented. Henderson was also concerned with his own standing as a poet in lieu of these discussions. The comment above is an attempt to validate his shift towards the folk idiom, based on a broad political affiliation with ‘the people’ and the form of their creative, communal self-expression. The ‘congenital tribute’ Henderson describes implies his faithfulness to an aspect of Burns’ legacy that is neglected by his peers. It is also an admission that his ‘other kinds of poetry’ had been less successful. This concession does, however, come with its own subtle qualification: the allowance he makes for the failings of his other kinds of poetry makes space for his songs as a legitimate ‘kind of poetry’ in themselves.