"A day to blow or get blown." The W. H. Auden poem that was too dirty for the New York Times Book Review. (Not safe for work or good taste)
posted by nasreddin on Mar 18, 2008 - 67 comments

Today is the centenary of W.H. Auden, one of the greatest poets of the twentieth century. Why not commemorate it by attending one of the many events honoring the man and marking the day? Auden wrote about anything and everything; his poems addressed such topics as the advent of World War II ("September 1, 1939", which gained new resonance after 9/11), grief ("Funeral Blues", used to great effect in Four Weddings and a Funeral), physics ("After Reading a Child's Guide to Modern Physics"), commencement addresses ("Under Which Lyre: A Reactionary Tract for the Times") unrequited love ("The More Loving One"), and the way life goes on ("Musée des Beaux Arts"). [more inside]
posted by Vidiot on Feb 20, 2007 - 36 comments

Carla Bruni puts poems by Emily Dickinson, W.B. Yeats, Dorothy Parker, Walter de la Mare, W.H. Auden, and Christina Rossetti to music. Listen. (via)
posted by anotherpanacea on Feb 16, 2007 - 17 comments

Hannah Arendt's Papers are digitally preserved by the Library of Congress. Read her lectures on Political Philosophy. Browse her correspondence. Here she castigates once-friend, Gershom Scholem, for his poor treatment of Eichmann in Jerusalem. Here she explains forgiveness to the hapless poet she called 'Wystan:' W. H. Auden.
posted by anotherpanacea on Jun 1, 2006 - 17 comments