Synopses & Reviews
One of the twentieth centurys most important poets, W. H. Auden stands as an eloquent example of an individual within whom thought and faith not only coexist but indeed nourish each other. This book is the first to explore in detail how Audens religious faith helped him to come to terms with himself as an artist and as a man, despite his early disinterest in religion and his homosexuality. Auden and Christianity shows also how Audens Anglican faith informs, and is often the explicit subject of, his poetry and prose.Arthur Kirsch, a leading Auden scholar, discusses the poets boyhood religious experience and the works he wrote before emigrating to the United States as well as his formal return to the Anglican Communion at the beginning of World War II. Kirsch then focuses on Audens criticism and on neglected and underestimated works of the poets later years. Through insightful readings of Audens writings and biography, Kirsch documents that Audens faith and his religious doubt were the matrix of his work and life.
Review
"W.H. Auden is one of the great Christian poets of the twentieth century. What a delight to have this penetrating, elegantly written study of Audens Christian faith as articulated in some of the finest poems and essays of our time."—The Very Rev. Samuel T. Lloyd III, Dean, Washington National Cathedral
Review
"W.H. Auden is one of the great Christian poets of the twentieth century. What aa delight to have this penetrating, elegantly written study of Auden's Christian faith as articulated in some of the finest poems and essays of our time."-The Very Rev. Samuel T. Lloyd III, Dean, Washington National Cathedral(The Very Rev. Samuel T. Lloyd III)
Review
"Kirsch's excellent book frames an informed and sensitive reading of the fascinatingly idiosyncratic Christianity presented in the life and writings of this major poet and modern intellectual."—John Hollander, Sterling Professor Emeritus of English, Yale University
Review
“A marvelous work of scholarship. . . .
Auden and Christianity fills a niche that has surprisingly, until now, remained empty.”—Pericles Lewis, Yale University
Synopsis
The first book to examine the profound relationship between Audens faith and art
About the Author
Arthur Kirsch is Professor of English, Emeritus, University of Virginia. He has written extensively on Shakespeare as well as Auden and recently edited a new edition of Audens The Sea and the Mirror: A Commentary on Shakespeares The Tempest.”