‘In England in the literary field, this tendency has expressed itself chiefly in the younger poets...WH Auden...Stephen Spender, C.D. Lewis...The collapse into subjectivity of Eliot, Joyce or Pound shows more and more clearly the fate of those who refused to admit the necessity of choice.’ John Cornford, ‘Left?’, 1933 John Cornford Evelyn Waugh

O what is that sound which so fills the ear Down in the valley drumming, drumming? Only the scarlet soldiers dear, The soldiers coming.... O What are they doing with all that gear; What are they doing this morning, this morning?... O haven’t they stopped for the doctor’s care; Haven’t they reined their horses, their horses?

The Addictions of Sin: W.H. Auden in His Own Words (Youtube) ‘I’m not one of those who believe that poetry need or even should be directly political, but in a critical period such as ours I do believe that the poet must have a direct knowledge of the major political events. from ‘Spain 1937’ ‘Yesterday all the past.’ (line 1) ‘Yesterday the assessment of insurance’ (line 5) ‘Yesterday the abolition of fairies and giants’ (line 9) ‘Yesterday the carving of angels and alarming gargoyles’ (line 12) ‘Yesterday the Sabbath of witches; but to-day the struggle’ (line 16) ‘To-morrow, perhaps the future’ (line 77) ‘To-morrow the enlarging of consciousness’ (line 80) ‘Tomorrow the rediscovery of romantic love’ (line 81) ‘To-morrow the bicycle races through the suburbs on summer evenings. But to-day the struggle.’ (line 93)

‘I sit in one of the dives On Fifty-Second Street Uncertain and afraid As the clever hopes expire Of a low dishonest decade. from ‘September 1, 1939’ ‘The Unknown Citizen’ To JS/07/M/378 This Marble Monument is Erected by the State... he held the correct opinions for the time of year When there was peace, he was for peace; when there was war, he went.

It is possible that in some periods the poet can absorb and feel all in his ordinary everyday life. Perhaps the supreme masters always can. But for the second order, and particularly today, what the poet knows, what he can write about, is what he has experienced in his own person. from ‘In Memory of W.B. Yeats’ (1939) You were silly like us; your gift survived it all: The parish of rich women, physical decay, Yourself. Mad Ireland hurt you into poetry. Now Ireland has her madness and her weather still For poetry makes nothing happen: it survives In the valley of its making where executives Would never want to tamper Earth receive an honoured guest In the nightmare of the dark Williams Yeats is laid to rest All the dogs of Europe bark, Let the Irish vessel lie And the living nations wait, Emptied of its poetry. Each sequestered in its hate... Follow poet, follow rightIn the deserts of the heart To the bottom of the night,Let the healing fountain start, With your unconstraining voiceIn the prison of his days Still persuade us to rejoice;... Teach the free man how to praise.

She looked over his shoulder For ritual pieties, White flower-garlanded heifers, Libation and sacrifice, But there on the shining metal Where the altar should have been, She saw by his flickering forge-light Quite another scene. The propagandist, whether moral or political, complains that the writer should use his powers over words to persuade people to a particular course of action, instead of fiddling while Rome burns. But Poetry is not concerned with telling people what to do, but with extending our knowledge of good and evil, perhaps making the necessity for action more urgent and its nature more clear, but only leading us to the point where it is possible for us to make a rational and moral choice. ‘Poetry as Memorable Speech’