22 pages • 44 minutes read
Wystan Hugh AudenIn Memory of W. B. Yeats
Fiction | Poem | Adult | Published in 1939A modern alternative to SparkNotes and CliffsNotes, SuperSummary offers high-quality Study Guides with detailed chapter summaries and analysis of major themes, characters, and more.
Further Reading & Resources
Related Poems
“On This Island” by W. H. Auden (1937)
Sometimes titled “Seascape” or “Look, Stranger,” this poem is one of only a few by Auden that consist entirely of natural description. Portraying the island of Great Britain, the poem fulfills the task presented in “In Memory of W. B. Yeats,” that the poet must “[t]each the free man how to praise” (Line 65). In this case, the praise is for the beauty of the natural environment, where land meets sea: “Look, stranger, on this island now / The leaping light for your delight discovers.”
“September 1, 1939” by W. H. Auden (1939)
The title refers to the day that Germany invaded Poland. Two days later, England and France declared war on Germany and World War II began. This was only several months after Auden had declared in his elegy for Yeats, “In the nightmare of the dark / All the dogs of Europe bark” (Lines 58-59). From his recently adopted home in New York, where he sits in a bar, Auden offers his reflections on how the Western world has gone so badly wrong. Feeling the need to “Show an affirming flame,” he states, “We must love one another or die.” Auden came to dislike the poem and omitted it from later editions of his work, although many still regard it as one of his finest. The form of the poem was influenced by Yeats’s poem, “Easter, 1916.”
“Lullaby” by W. H. Auden (1940)
This is one of many poems Auden wrote about love. Two lovers lie together in bed at night. They love with a tenderness that touches on universal love, although over time they will have to endure all the vicissitudes of life. They will not even be faithful to each other. Love always has an end and exacts a price: “Every farthing of the cost, / All the dreaded cards foretell, / Shall be paid.” The lovers must enjoy their love while they can. As dawn comes, the speaker hopes that the new day will be a “day of sweetness” and that the “mortal world” will be “enough.” In its celebration of love, ephemeral though it may be, the poem recalls “In Memory of W. B. Yeats,” in which the task of the poet is to “persuade us to rejoice” (Line 69).
Further Literary Resources
“A Summary and Analysis of W. H. Auden’s ‘In Memory of W. B. Yeats’” by Oliver Tearle
Tearle discusses the different forms and styles of each of the three sections of the poem. He also analyzes the poem in terms of the role of poetry in today’s world, pointing out that it embodies the modern critical idea known as the “intentional fallacy” or the “death of the poet,” in which the meaning of a poem lies not with the author but with the reader.
“‘In Memory of W. B. Yeats’ by W. H. Auden: A Reading” by A. E. M. Baumann (2017)
Baumann sees in Auden’s poem a recurring opposition between the material world (the world of the many) and the spiritual world (the world of the few). The poem as a whole is pessimistic, presenting a “dark vision of the world.” One note: Baumann identifies Section 3 as written in “iambic quadrameter (without the opening unstressed syllable)” but that is not correct; the verse is trochaic tetrameter, without the final unstressed syllable.
“William Butler Yeats” by the Poetry Foundation
This substantial introduction to the life and work of Yeats takes note of such elements as Yeats’s several changes in style, and how he rejected Modernism, continuing to prefer rhyme and strict stanza form. The article also mentions that Auden “praised Yeats as the savior of English lyric poetry” and said that he had written “‘some of the most beautiful poetry’ of modern times.”
Listen to Poem
The date of the recording is not noted. In it, Auden omits one stanza from the original 1940 edition—the one that begins “Time that with this strange excuse” (Line 52). Auden reads with an English accent, although he pronounces long “a” sounds as an American (e.g., “last afternoon” in Line 12).
