W. H. Auden's Book of Light Verse

Book Description
W. H. Auden's transformative anthology, assembled when his own work was at its most provocative and searching, is a rethinking of the history of English-language poetry. Taking full account of popular traditions, Auden includes ballads, chanteys, ditties, nursery rhymes, street calls, bathroom graffiti, tombstone epitaphs, folk songs, vaudeville turns, and blues, not to mention limericks and clerihews. In lieu of the cloudy effusions and sentimental intimations of the post-Romantic lyric, Auden looked for a poetry that was clear, enjoyable, and absolutely modern. These are poems of wit, sarcasm, color, and plain brilliance, from Chaucer to Byron and beyond. This new edition restores previously censored poems.


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"Auden's anthology of light verse is packed with surprising finds while also offering a rethinking of the poetic canon. Commissioned by Oxford University Press in the 1930s, when Auden's own work was at its boldest, the book caught its original publisher off guard. For it is less a collection of humorous verses than a celebration of the popular voice in English, in which the work of great satirists like Swift and Byron keeps company with ballads, chanteys, ditties, nursery rhymes, street calls, bathroom graffiti, epitaphs, folk songs, vaudeville turns, limericks, and blues. Turning away from the post-Romantic cult of the sentimental lyric, Auden features poetry that is clear, enjoyable, and, no matter its age, absolutely modern." This new edition includes previously censored poems, together with Auden's introduction and a new preface.


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