richard owen cambridge, the english poet and satirical author, declared that he hoped to die before brown so that he could "see heaven before it was 'improved'." this was a typical statement reflecting the controversy about brown's work, which has continued over the last 200 years. by contrast, a recent historian and author, richard bisgrove, described brown's process as perfecting nature by "judicious manipulation of its components, adding a tree here or a concealed head of water there. his art attended to the formal potential of ground, water, trees and so gave to english landscape its ideal forms. the difficulty was that less capable imitators and less sophisticated spectators did not see nature perfected... they saw simply what they took to be nature."