The Hidden Law: The Poetry of W.H. AudenIn this study - the fruit of a lifelong critical and imaginative engagement with W H. Auden's works - Anthony Hecht identifies and traces consistent habits of thought and belief within the poet's extensive and varied writings and through his celebrated conversions and repudiations, literary and otherwise. Hecht acknowledges that Auden's poems "both invite the intrusive scrutiny of the cryptographer and deny him access". Yet the readings he offers of poems from every phase of Auden's career, along with dramatic works and critical essays, manage to explicate and illuminate Auden's rich (and often cryptic) allusiveness without murdering to dissect. Among the themes that connect Auden's works are his deep interest in the workings of language; his notion of the ultimate frivolity of art; his interest in the nature of heroism; his understanding of the relation of public to private life; the development of his religious thought; and what Auden called the "hidden law" that governs human existence - a strict and retaliatory force, something like poetic justice, that gives form to our best literature and shapes our personal fates. Hecht identifies these preoccupations in Auden's work - and shows how they cut across the many genres in which he wrote - without losing sight of each poem's individual history and context. As one of Auden's most distinguished poetic heirs, Anthony Hecht is uniquely qualified to illuminate both the reading and the writing of these essential works of twentieth-century literature. |
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Page 57
... reason's gift would add , The liberal appetite and power , The rightness of a god . Who nurtured in that fine tradition Predicted the result , Guessed love by nature suited to The intricate ways of guilt ? That human ligaments could so ...
... reason's gift would add , The liberal appetite and power , The rightness of a god . Who nurtured in that fine tradition Predicted the result , Guessed love by nature suited to The intricate ways of guilt ? That human ligaments could so ...
Page 58
... reason , reserved for men and bestowed by " the love that moves the sun and the other stars . " Though man can be like the lion or like its quarry , can be either predator or victim , he has the gift of reason , conferred by a gift of ...
... reason , reserved for men and bestowed by " the love that moves the sun and the other stars . " Though man can be like the lion or like its quarry , can be either predator or victim , he has the gift of reason , conferred by a gift of ...
Page 76
... reason , the capacity to recognize general laws , and the function of the poet is to celebrate the Rational City and pour scorn on its enemies . Toward the end of the eighteenth century - Rousseau is one of the first symptoms [ note ...
... reason , the capacity to recognize general laws , and the function of the poet is to celebrate the Rational City and pour scorn on its enemies . Toward the end of the eighteenth century - Rousseau is one of the first symptoms [ note ...
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Common terms and phrases
acknowledged addressed admired allowed appears Auden authority become begins believe body Byron called Christian claim clear close Collected comes composed concerns continues course death described dream earlier early effect Eliot entirely essay example expressed eyes fact feel figure final follows give heart hero hope human important innocent interest kind language later least less Letter lines living look means mind moral nature never night once opening pass passage past perhaps play poem poet poetry political possible prayer present reader reason recall reference regard religious represent seems sense serious sexual social society sort speaks stanza suggests things thought turn voice writing written wrote Yeats