THE CONVERSATION PIECES OF W. H. AUDEN: THE SEARCH FOR AND CREATION OF "GENUINE COMMUNITY"
Abstract
The intimate tone of the conversation pieces W. H. Auden writes engages his readers. It allows them to separate themselves momentarily from the world's disorders, participate in a private community, and depart with the strength to search for and create their own genuine communities. How does Auden create this intimacy of tone? By extending the traditional themes and stylistic conventions of other poets who write the conversation piece (such as Horace, Ben Jonson, Alexander Pope, and W. B. Yeats), Auden celebrates the power of the "genuine community" to create the hope which offsets the disorder of the world. As world traveler, city resident, dweller in a private residence, and neighbor, Auden continually searches for and attempts to create "a genuine community." In each role, the poet recognizes his personal inadequacy. His own human weaknesses--doubt, self-indulgence, a desire for the east of escape--often overwhelm the search or the creation, and he despairs. Yet those rare glimpses of the Edenic past which he perceives on his travels, those rare glimpses of the New Jerusalem in the city he works to build, and those rare moments of rejuvenation in the dwelling set apart from the world's violence sustain his hope and forge his will to forge his will to struggle onward. As a result, the poet can reach out in his poetry towards his neighbor who suffers--his personal friends and his readers--and offer them the encouragement that can assist them in their struggle.
Degree
Ph.D.
Subject Area
British and Irish literature
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