W.H. Auden at Work

In W. H. Auden at Work Levitan and Kulseth explore the poetry Auden wrote while he and Christopher Isherwood were on a journey to China in 1938. China was at war, and Auden's poetry reflects that. Auden explores cultural differences—for example in "In Time of War" (sonnet XXV) Auden wrote “children are really loved here, even by police”—making the reader feel the differences between London and Hong Kong. In many cases, Levitan and Culseth provide more than one version of a sonnet so that the reader can see Auden’s editing. Auden was a technical master: each poem is tight of line and meter and pays attention to sound, rhythm, and pacing. Auden's care with poetics—this humility to the art form, this rarified form of language—should be taught in poetry classes. Reading Auden shows the poet waking up inside language, then working it over and over until he has it right. Inexperienced poets may think that poetry just comes to one. In fact, poetry takes many drafts, at least it did for Auden. Recommended. Graduate students, researchers, faculty. * Choice Reviews *
“Auden's revisions have long provoked critical responses that almost always misinterpreted them. Alexis Levitin and Joshua Kulseth’s book is not only the most judicious and intensive study of Auden's revisions but is the only one that began with Auden's cooperation and encouragement. This book is a unique and indispensable contribution to literary studies.” -- Edward Mendelson, Columbia University
“W.H. Auden at Work: The Craft of Revision, by Alexis Levitin, is an elegant, intriguing tour de force of Auden’s deft and brilliant hand at revision. Equally intriguing is the story of how this book came to be – the unlikely collaboration of its authors and their shared deep, even obsessive, abiding love for Auden and his work. Levitin and Kulseth “make it new” all over again and drive home with precise, thoroughly forensic detail the utter relevance of Auden and the enduring lessons on craft that he dispensed. Kulseth unabashedly details in his introduction ‘a record of [his] wonder at these poems, in the hopes that [we] too might wonder …’ Indeed ‘wonder’ is the operative word, and of profound magnitude, in light of this extraordinary, painstakingly researched and wholly necessary volume.” -- Joseph Bathanti, Appalachian State University