W. H. Auden (1907–1973) is one of the greatest poets of the twentieth century, and his reputation has only grown since his death. Published on the hundredth anniversary of the year in which he began to write poetry, this is the second volume of the first complete edition of Auden’s poems. Edited, introduced, and annotated by renowned Auden scholar Edward Mendelson, this definitive edition includes all the poems Auden wrote for publication, in their original texts, and all his later revised versions, as well as poems and songs he never published, some of them printed here for the first time.
This volume follows Auden as a mature artist, containing all the poems that he published or submitted for publication from 1940 until his death in 1973, at age sixty-six. This includes all his poetry collections from this period, from The Double Man (1941) through Epistle to a Godson (1972). The volume also features an edited version of his incomplete, posthumous book Thank You, Fog, as well as his self-designated “posthumous” poems.
The main text presents the poems in their original published versions. The notes include the extensive revisions that he made to his poems over the course of his career, and provide explanations of obscure references.
The first volume of this edition, Poems, Volume I: 1927–1939, is also available.
Awards and Recognition
- A Times Literary Supplement Book of the Year
- A New Statesman Book of the Year
- A Daily Telegraph Best Poetry Book of the Year
- A Tablet Book of the Year
"A dazzling, scholarly triumph."—Michael Dirda, Washington Post
"Mendelson has championed a reassessment of the poet’s later work. He has not achieved this through polemic, but rather through a patient and careful effort. . . . I have been reading and teaching and writing about Auden’s poetry for many years, but I have taken the opportunity offered by these two volumes to try, as best I can, to encounter it all anew."—Alan Jacobs, Harper's Magazine
"Glorious."—Bel Mooney, Daily Mail
"Exhilaratingly prospective. . . . some of the most vivid poems ever committed to English . . . these two books are a monument to the acumen, scholarship, and perseverance of Edward Mendelson."—Ron Horning, Brooklyn Rail
"Magnificent. . . . Mendelson’s Auden has long been regarded as a monument of literary scholarship, and these two heavy poetry volumes complete the grounds for that acclaim. . . . An amazing thicket of scholarship and commentary draped around some of the most-studied and most-quoted poetry of the 20th century."—Steve Donoghue, Open Letters Review
"To read Auden’s Complete Works therefore is not just to encounter the inventions of a polymathic, often ingenious writer and poet, but to enter into a ‘whole climate of opinion,’ to explore an age by way of one of its representative figures. . . . Edifying."—James Matthew Wilson, National Review
"The new two-volume set of W. H. Auden's complete poems, meticulously assembled and presented by Edward Mendelson, is highly recommended."—David Lehman, Best American Poetry Blog
"[Auden’s] oeuvre has been given a new life. . . . [in these] two new and heavily annotated volumes. . . . [Mendelson’s] mastery of this sprawling material is legendary."—Brad Leithauser, Wall Street Journal
"As authoritative a presentation as we are likely ever to get. . . . Wonderful books."—David Mason, Hudson Review
"In a remarkable work of scholarship, editor Edward Mendelson has assembled every poem and every revision—and explains every reference. . . . For the budding or mature poet, it’s indispensable."—Mosaic
"A remarkable editorial enterprise."—David Bromwich, Times Literary Supplement
"These volumes show the poetic beauty and intellectual audacity of Auden’s work with a power that left me exultant."—Richard Davenport-Hines, Times Literary Supplement
"Auden can be magically conversational, charming and sophisticated, vivid, lyrical and amusing. A master of rhyme and metre, he has a brilliant range of allusions and important ideas, wisdom and moral force."—Jeffrey Meyers, PN Review
"A grand thing."—Tristram Fane Saunders, Daily Telegraph
"Mendelson could not have conceived a more fitting tribute to this poet than doing for Auden’s work what Auden was always attempting to do for his own life: organize it intellectually into a grand system that takes in every detail and provides aesthetic satisfaction to the soul. . . . The definitive edition of Auden’s poetry."—Stephen J. Schuler, Ad Fontes
"[These two volumes] compiled and magisterially edited by Edward Mendelson, a leading Auden authority, should show readers what a versatile and commanding voice the poet possessed."—Andrew Rosenheim, The Tablet
"Edward Mendelson’s two-volume collection of Auden’s poems, spanning 1927 to 1973, is a welcome arrival, compiled by sage hands. . . . [Mendelson] is perhaps the poet’s best reader."—Nick Ripatrazone, National Review
"Two volumes which Auden admirers and scholars will surely welcome as the apotheosis of the Princeton series, and of Mendelson’s Auden publications."—Mick Gowar, Book 2.0
