|
Poet: W. H. Auden
Poem: The Novelist
Year: Published/Written in 1939
Comment 1 of 1, added on August 5th, 2006 at 7:44 AM.
Auden's "The Novelist",like all of his poems on commonplacesubjects,deals with the distinctive qualities of a novelist in the traditional sonnet form.The entrance to the poem baffles the reader with the deascription not of the novelist but of the poets.
The first five lines of the poem, excluding the phrase "but he",deal with the poets who catch universal admiration with their capacity of catching the high points of human life:
They canamaze us like a thunderstorm
** ** **
They can dash forward like hussars,
With such ur spectacles,poets like Keats and Byron have caught the readers' eyes transfixed.But it is very pathetic to note that the novelist has to create the "bagy monsters"which are the objects of hatred.By this I do not mean that novels are not interesting, what I mean to say is that novel are in most places as dull and boring as life is. In his baggy monsters,the novelist depicts things in an awkard and plain manner.In his novel, love which has given birth to so much of courtly poetrybecomes "vulgar complaint"as it is in our daily life.Thus the novel is a realistic representation of life that the novelist has to achive ,putting up with"all the wrongs of men".
"The Novelist" is in fact the poet's expression of his great admiration for the title of a novelist which Auden tried to achieve,but in vain.He not only empathies with the novelist but also describe how difficult it is to be a novelist.
Dibakara bhoi from India
Are you looking for more information on this poem? Perhaps you are trying to analyze it? The poem, The Novelist, has received one comment so far. Click here to read it, and perhaps post a comment of your own. Of course you can also always discuss poems by W. H. Auden with others on the Poetry Connection poetry forum!
|
Auden's "The Novelist",like all of his poems on commonplacesubjects,deals with the distinctive qualities of a novelist in the traditional sonnet form.The entrance to the poem baffles the reader with the deascription not of the novelist but of the poets.
The first five lines of the poem, excluding the phrase "but he",deal with the poets who catch universal admiration with their capacity of catching the high points of human life:
They canamaze us like a thunderstorm
** ** **
They can dash forward like hussars,
With such ur spectacles,poets like Keats and Byron have caught the readers' eyes transfixed.But it is very pathetic to note that the novelist has to create the "bagy monsters"which are the objects of hatred.By this I do not mean that novels are not interesting, what I mean to say is that novel are in most places as dull and boring as life is. In his baggy monsters,the novelist depicts things in an awkard and plain manner.In his novel, love which has given birth to so much of courtly poetrybecomes "vulgar complaint"as it is in our daily life.Thus the novel is a realistic representation of life that the novelist has to achive ,putting up with"all the wrongs of men".
"The Novelist" is in fact the poet's expression of his great admiration for the title of a novelist which Auden tried to achieve,but in vain.He not only empathies with the novelist but also describe how difficult it is to be a novelist.
Dibakara bhoi from India