W. H. Auden
W. H. Auden
Wystan Hugh Audenwas an English poet, who later became an American citizen. He is best known for love poems such as "Funeral Blues," poems on political and social themes such as "September 1, 1939" and "The Shield of Achilles," poems on cultural and psychological themes such as The Age of Anxiety, and poems on religious themes such as "For the Time Being" and "Horae Canonicae." He was born in York, grew up in and near Birmingham in a professional middle-class...
NationalityEnglish
ProfessionPoet
Date of Birth21 February 1907
men world action
The true men of action in our time, those who transform the world, are not the politicians and statesmen, but the scientists
helping-others earth helping
We were put on this Earth to help others. Why others were put here is beyond me.
giving facts
A shilling life will give you all the facts.
fairy-tale tales hunts
To hunt for symbols in a fairy tale is absolutely fatal.
blessed self force
Blessed be all metrical rules that forbid automatic responses, force us to have second thoughts, free us from the fetters of Self.
happiness men important
It is nonsense to speak of 'higher' and 'lower' pleasures. To a hungry man it is, rightly, more important that he eat than that he philosophize.
pain mean anxiety
To be happy means to be free, not from pain or fear, but from care or anxiety.
fall home sleep
Warm are the still and lucky miles, White shores of longing stretch away, A light of recognition fills The whole great day, and bright The tiny world of lovers' arms. Silence invades the breathing wood Where drowsy limbs a treasure keep, Now greenly falls the learned shade Across the sleeping brows And stirs their secret to a smile. Restored! Returned! The lost are borne On seas of shipwreck home at last: See! In a fire of praising burns The dry dumb past, and we Our life-day long shall part no more.
unique reality two
One demands two things of a poem. Firstly, it must be a well-made verbal object that does honor to the language in which it is written. Secondly, it must say something significant about a reality common to us all, but perceived from a unique perspective. What the poet says has never been said before, but, once he has said it, his readers recognize its validity for themselves.
dog grief cutting
Stop all the clocks, cut off the telephone, Prevent the dog from barking with a juicy bone. Silence the pianos and with muffled drum Bring out the coffin, let the mourners come.
suffering masters
About suffering they were never wrong, The Old Masters.
men taste uncertain
The surest sign that a man has a genuine taste of his own is that he is uncertain of it.
suffering criticism ugly
It's better to say, 'I'm suffering,' than to say, 'This landscape is ugly.
listening prose remarks
Yet no one hears his own remarks as prose.