W.H. Auden in context

Description

"W. H. Auden is a giant of twentieth-century English poetry whose writings demonstrate a sustained engagement with the times in which he lived. But how did the century's shifting cultural terrain affect him and his work? Written by distinguished poets and scholars, these brief but authoritative essays offer a varied set of coordinates by which to chart Auden's continuously evolving career, examining key aspects of his environmental, cultural, political and creative contexts. Reaching beyond mere biography, these essays present Auden as the product of ongoing negotiations between himself, his time and posterity, exploring the enduring power of his poetry to unsettle and provoke. The collection will prove valuable for scholars, researchers and students of English literature, cultural studies and creative writing"-- Introduction / Tony Sharpe -- Part I. Contexts of Place: -- 1. Auden's northerliness / Tony Sharpe -- 2. Two cities: Berlin and New York / Patrick Deer -- 3. Ideas about England / Stan Smith -- 4. Ideas of America / Aidan Wasley -- 5. At home in Italy and Austria, 1948-1973 / Justin Quinn -- Part II. Social and Cultural Contexts: -- 6. Auden and the class system / Adrian Caesar -- 7. The Church of England: Auden's Anglicanism / Tony Sharpe -- 8. British homosexuality, 1920-1939 / Gregory Woods -- 9. American homosexuality, 1939-1972 / Richard R. Bozorth -- 10. Auden among women / Janet Montefiore -- 11 . Auden and the American literary world / Aidan Wasley -- 12. Atlantic Auden / Michael Wood -- Part III. Political, Historical and Theoretical Contexts: -- 13. Communism and fascism in 1920s and 1930s Britain / Matthew Worley -- 14. Auden and wars / Patrick Deer -- 15. Auden and Freud: the psychoanalytic text / John R. Boly -- 16. Auden's theology / Alan Jacobs -- 17. Auden in history / Susannah Young-ah Gottlieb -- Part IV (I). Creative Contexts: -- 18. The body / Edward Mendelson -- 19. The cinema / Keith Williams -- 20. 1930s British drama / Steve Nicholson -- 21. The documentary moment / David Collard -- 22. Travel writing / Tim Youngs -- 23. Auden and post-war opera / Michael Symmons Roberts -- Part IV (II). Precursors and Contemporaries: -- 24. Earlier English influences / Chris Jones -- 25. Auden and Shakespeare / Stephen Regan -- 26. Yeats / Michael O'Neill -- 27. Eliot / Hugh Haughton -- 28. Some modernists in early Auden / Gareth Reeves -- 29. Auden in German / Rainer Emig -- 30. Auden and Isherwood / James J. Berg and Chris Freeman -- Part V. The 'Most Professional' Poet: -- 31. Auden in prose / Sean O'Brien -- 32. Auden and little magazines / Andrew Thacker -- 33. Double take: Auden in collaboration / Richard Badenhausen -- 34. Auden and prosody / Sean O'Brien -- 35. Auden's forms / Seamus Perry.