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
past cheerful population
It is already possible to imagine a society in which the majority of the population, that is to say, its laborers, will have almost as much leisure as in earlier times was enjoyed by the aristocracy. When one recalls how aristocracies in the past actually behaved, the prospect is not cheerful.
thinking style suffering
Slavery is so intolerable a condition that the slave can hardly escape deluding himself into thinking that he is choosing to obey his master's commands when, in fact, he is obliged to. Most slaves of habit suffer from this delusion and so do some writers, enslaved by an all too personal style.
fate thinking long
So long as we think of it objectively, time is Fate or Chance, the factor in our lives for which we are not responsible, and about which we can do nothing; but when we begin to think of it subjectively, we feel responsible for our time, and the notion of punctuality arises.
children growing-up differences
We do not change as we grow up. The difference between the child and the adult is that the former doesn't know who he is and the latter does.
hell factories assembly
One cannot walk through an assembly factory and not feel that one is in Hell.
evil politics imagine
Good can imagine Evil; but Evil cannot imagine Good.
fire immortal composing
Composing mortals with immortal fire.
language metaphorical humans
Human language is mythological and metaphorical by nature.
death philosophical picnics
Death is the sound of distant thunder at a picnic.
horse gun wicked
If time were the wicked sheriff in a horse opera, I'd pay for riding lessons and take his gun away.
sunny-afternoon shy sunny-day
We all have these places where shy humiliations gambol on sunny afternoons.
forgiveness party unique
Murder is unique in that it abolishes the party it injures, so that society has to take the place of the victim and on his behalf demand atonement or grant forgiveness; it is the one crime in which society has a direct interest.
hero demise mortals
No hero is mortal till he dies.
earth needs mankind
Soft as the earth is mankind and both need to be altered.