Edwin Muir, Scottish poet and critic, will deliver the first of this year's Charles Eliot Norton lectures tonight. His talk, entitled "The Ballads: The Natural Estate," will start at 8:30 p.m. in New Lecture Hall.

Muir will give two more lectures this month on consecutive Wednesday evenings, all based on the general topic of "The Estate of Poetry." He will give a second series of three lectures on the same subject in the spring.

According to Archibald MacLeish, Boylston Professor of Rhetoric and Oratory, Muir is "one of the foremost living poets in English." He is in residence at the University this year as the Charles Eliot Norton Professor of Poetry.

The professorship is held annually by an individual of distinguished achievement in the fine arts. Last year the position remained unfilled when none of those invited were able to accept. Past holders include T. S. Eliot, Thornton Wilder, e. e. cummings, Robert Frost, Igor Stravinsky, Paul Hindemith, and Aaron Copland.