Generations of art students have been encouraged to read his books on the history of Australian art. He has been revered, rejected, loved and loathed by young and old. Julie Copeland of ABC Radio Nationals Sunday Morning  Exhibit A has interviewed Bernard Smith many times over the years, about his books, his art criticism, his autobiography. In the lead up to his new books publication The Formalesque, and on the occasion of his 90th birthday in October 2006 she asked him to recap for Artlink readers, how the varied influences of his early life came together to produce Place, Taste and Tradition in 1945 when he was 29 years old.