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
W. H. Auden quotes about
summer waiting important
Why doesn't the United States take over the monarchy and unite with England? England does have important assets. Naturally the longer you wait, the more they will dwindle. At least you could use it for a summer resort instead of Maine.
rain cake complaining
My face looks like a wedding-cake left out in the rain.
party practice homosexuality
I'm always amazed at the American practice of allowing one party to a homosexual act to remain passive--it's so undemocratic. Sexmust be mutual.
cat way glad
Cats can be very funny, and have the oddest ways of showing they're glad to see you...
pay attention praying
To pray is to pay attention to something or someone other than oneself...
fate puppets chance
Every high C accurately struck demolishes the theory that we are the irresponsible puppets of fate or chance.
writing important age
It's frightfully important for a writer to be his age, not to be younger or older than he is. One might ask, "What should I write at the age of sixty-four," but never, "What should I write in 1940.
criticism conversation casual
Criticism should be a casual conversation.
drama practice community
Drama began as the act of a whole community. Ideally, there would be no speculators. In practice, every member of the audience should feel like an understudy.
work men thinking
A tremendous number of people in America work very hard at something that bores them. Even a rich man thinks he has to go down to the office everyday. Not because he likes it but because he can't think of anything else to do.
god usa america
God bless the USA, so large, so friendly, and so rich.
people negative bad-people
Whatever you do, good or bad, people will always have something negative to say
work thinking order
In order that people may be happy in their work, these three things are needed: They must be fit for it: they must not do too much of it: and they must have a sense of success in it - not a doubtful sense, such as needs some testimony of others for its confirmation, but a sure sense, or rather knowledge, that so much work has been done well, and fruitfully done, whatever the world may say or think about it.
differences age who-we-are
Between the ages of twenty and forty we are engaged in the process of discovering who we are, which involves learning the differences between accidental limitations which it is our duty to outgrow and the necessary limitations of our nature beyond which we cannot trespass with impunity.