W.H. Auden - The Great American Writer

And the poetry he invented was easy to understand;

He knew human folly like the back of his hand,

And was greatly interested in armies and fleets;

When he laughed, respectable senators burst with laughter,

And when he cried the little children died in the streets.

Wystan Hugh Auden, an English-born American writer, was one of the most important poets of the 20th century. His works were not only influential at the time of writing, but also touch on such complex social and personal issues as to be relevant to any time period. While taking elements of other contemporary poets, Auden’s poetry, portraying a deep understanding of the human psyche and of the world at large, exemplifies a distinct style which Auden himself cultivated.

W.H. Auden was born in York, the son of a physician. At first interested in science, he soon turned to poetry. In 1925 he entered Christ Church College, University of Oxford, where he became the center of a group of young leftist writers who generally expressed a socialist viewpoint, while continuing the artistic revolution of such earlier writers as T. S. Eliot, James Joyce, and

This poem also expresses that government makes it seem that everyone else is doing the “right thing”, so you must follow in their footsteps and if you do so your reward is a happy and fulfilled life with all the comforts of the modern man. The standards are constantly changing so that you will never reach the optimum point, therefore you must always strive to improve. We the people have followed the same uniform procedures in determining our presidents since the founding of our country, yet we are now being told these standards are “outdated” and “unreliable”, which in turns breaks down our faith and the faith of other countries in our political system. Auden expresses a similar opinion in his poem. He presents the idea of the good society, at best a possibility, yet never actually achievable, but one in which we the people must always work towards. As citizens, we know the obligations of our citizenship, however it often times is the officials we tend to elect that forget their obligations to us.

It was Hitler over Europe, saying: “They must die”;

In his later years Auden spent part of the year at his apartment in New York and part in Italy--later still, in Kirchstetten, Austria, where he owned a house memorialized in Thanksgiving for a Habitat (1965). He received the National Medal for Literature in 1967. With his close friend Chester Kallman he collaborated on opera libretti, including Stravinsky's The Rake's Progress (1951). He returned to Oxford as an honorary fellow in 1972. (Callan 64)

‘Poetry is not concerned with telling people what to do, but with extending our knowledge of good and evil… leading us to the point where it is possible for us to make a rational and moral choice.’ (Brophy 32)

In the December 1938 issue of The Adelphi George Orwell balked at the phrase “necessary murder” and attacked “this utterly irresponsible intelligentsia” and the alliance of “the gangster and the pansy”: “Mr.Auden can write about ‘the acceptance of guilt for the necessary murder’ because he has never committed a murder… possibly never even seen a murdered man’s corpse” (Crick 435)

It is no surprise that Auden’s political views shine through into his poetry. Considering he lived in Germany during the rise and establishment of the Nazi regime, his opinion of totalitarian power and social structure were, no doubt, influenced. Although he himself was not a victim of the Nazi persecutions, he did however have personal experience with the matter as his parents sheltered a succession of Jewish refugees while he was living in Germany. In his Refugee Blues (1939) he takes on the persona of a Jewish refugee, accurately expressing their sentiments in the lines:

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