The "Gay Apprentice": Ashbery, Aun, and a Portra of the Artist as a Young Cric on JSTOR

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The first full-length nsiratn of Aun as a homosexual poet, this volume shows that Aun's reer was tied to a procs of gay self-terrogatn unpa... | CUP

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    Edward Heath was told poet should be led out over ‘utterly revoltg’ vers about gay sex and Aun’s cisn to be an Amerin cizen * was auden gay *

    The sexual act scribed by the poem microspic physlogil tail is "Platonic" only the popular sense that is perfect of s 's sce bee mon nsens that, y, the openly gay wrer did e his skills to whip up an erotic medatn on Afternoon Delight.

    He never wrote about his homosexualy except for a few poems which he did not publicly acknowledge, but he was not closeted his life outsi the public sphere. The nuptials were nothg more than a formaly, sce Aun was gay and unted as his real marriage his long relatnship wh the Amerin poet Chter Kallman.

    For a time he believed that gratifyg his homosexual sir would enable him to outgrow them, but after nearly 10 months Berl, durg which he traveled some Germany and returned twice briefly to England, his new eedom had produced moments of happs but no permanent transformatn. He missed the Berl life, the Cosy Corner (a gay bar he and Isherwood equented), and probably a boy lled Willi wh whom he had apparently begun a new affair.

    Aidan Wasley, The "Gay Apprentice": Ashbery, Aun, and a Portra of the Artist as a Young Cric, Contemporary Lerature, Vol. 43, No. 4 (Wter, 2002), pp. 667-708 * was auden gay *

    He had rejected promiscuy, yet guilt about his homosexualy ntually drove him search of new lovers. He also observed the journal that the torment of his homosexualy was, for him, one of s attractns; he associated mutual love wh spair.

    Still, after he had spent ls than a year altogether Berl, Aun's feelg for the dialect and the sexy slang of the gay bars is imprsive; Mr.

    Edward Heath was told poet should be led out over ‘utterly revoltg’ vers about gay sex and Aun’s cisn to be an Amerin cizen.

    * was auden gay *

    He was one of the most acplished poets of the 20th century, but WH Aun was emed unsuable for the role of poet lreate after wrg a “filthy” pornographic poem that would “brg disgrace” on the Heath, the Conservative prime mister, was told 1972 that Aun - prevly scribed by officials as “probably the bt poet” alive - had wrten “utterly revoltg” vers about gay sex, meang that together wh his cisn to bee an Amerin cizen he should be led out. Excerpts om My Dear Boy: Gay Love Letters through the.

    *BEAR-MAGAZINE.COM* WAS AUDEN GAY

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H. Aun</h1><div class="BaseWrap-sc-gjQpdd BaseText-ewhhUZ SplScreenContentHearDek-emptdL iUEiRd wOnsu dJrDEb">There was nothg more admirable Aun than his firm belief sany.</div><div data-ttid="BylWrapper" class="BylWrapper-KIudk irTIfE byl SplScreenContentHearByle-kvEhqE ejWxsm"><p class="ByleWrapper-jWHrLH bwbwth byle byl__byle" data-ttid="ByleWrapper" emProp="thor" emType="><span emProp="name" class="ByleNamWrapper-jbHncj fuDQVo"><span data-ttid="ByleName" class="ByleName-kwmrLn lOLCm byle__name"><span class="BaseWrap-sc-gjQpdd BaseText-ewhhUZ BylePreamble-iJolpQ iUEiRd jslZfG uhfVi byle__preamble">By </span><a class="BaseWrap-sc-gjQpdd BaseText-ewhhUZ BaseLk-eNWuiM ByleLk-gEnFiw iUEiRd ggMZaT cXqSTL brYZgj byle__name-lk button" href="/ntributors/hannah-arendt">Hannah Arendt</a></span></span></p></div><time data-ttid="ContentHearPublishDate" dateTime="1975-01-12T19:00:00-05:00" class="SplScreenContentHearPublishDate-bMGEVk gvRvVr">January 12, 1975</time><div 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class="RponsiveImagePicture-cWuUZO dUOtEa SplScreenContentHearLe-bGywFh gyNssY rponsive-image"><source media="(max-width: 767px)" srcSet=" 120w, 240w, 320w, 640w, 960w" siz="100vw"/><source media="(m-width: 768px)" srcSet=" 120w, 240w, 320w, 640w, 960w, 1280w, 1600w, 1920w, 2240w" siz="100vw"/><img alt="Aun walkg on a snowy street." class="RponsiveImageContaer-eybHBd fptoWY rponsive-image__image" src="></picture></span></div></div></div></div><div class="GridWrapper-cAzTTK eRggVV grid grid-margs grid-ems-0 SplScreenContentHearGrid-kFpOdh fLkIyA"><div class="GridItem-buujkM kHPPIF grid--em"><div class="CaptnWrapper-jSZdqE iTuhkZ ptn SplScreenContentHearCaptn-iOfEOv ckLUKG"><span class="BaseWrap-sc-gjQpdd BaseText-ewhhUZ CaptnText-bHjzlu iUEiRd hWyo iXWezO ptn__text">W. H. Aun, St. Mark’s Place, New York, March 3, 1960.</span><span class="BaseWrap-sc-gjQpdd BaseText-ewhhUZ CaptnCred-ejegDm iUEiRd iicloT jbIJNS ptn__cred">Photograph by Richard Avedon / © The Richard Avedon Foundatn</span></div></div></div></hear></div><div data-attribute-verso-pattern="article-body" class="ArticlePageContentBackGround-cNiFNN kbAoLA article-body__ntent"><div class="ActnBarWrapperContent-lasBkU cAHp"><div class="ActnBarWrapperComponent-cjwxLS bEeSLb"><div data-attr-viewport-monor="" class="ActnBarWrapper-dhxmQh kNjTbQ viewport-monor-anchor"><button id="bookmark" aria-label="Save this story" class="ActnBarButton-dyFOZU hQrwCF bookmark large-screen"><span class="ActnBarSendaryButtonPrimaryIn-isbvyN cAwccV bookmark-button-in"><svg class="in in-bookmark" width="24" height="24" viewBox="0 0 24 24" fill="none" xmlns="><tle>Save this story</tle><path class="in-bookmark-fill" d="M20 23.9508L12.5 19.7312L5 23.9508V2.95081H14V3.93211H6V22.1845L12.5 18.5536L19 22.1845V8.83866H20V23.9508Z"></path><path class="in-bookmark-fill" d="M23 3H20V0H19V3H16V4H19V7H20V4H23V3Z"></path></svg></span><span class="BaseWrap-sc-gjQpdd BaseText-ewhhUZ ActnBarButtonText-bYXYuh iUEiRd bkefvo gkccfO">Save this story</span></button></div><div data-attr-viewport-monor="" class="ActnBarWrapper-dhxmQh kAEsuD viewport-monor-anchor"><button id="bookmark" aria-label="Save this story" class="ActnBarButton-dyFOZU cjjxgx bookmark mobile"><span class="ActnBarSendaryButtonPrimaryIn-isbvyN cAwccV bookmark-button-in"><svg class="in in-bookmark" width="24" height="24" viewBox="0 0 24 24" fill="none" xmlns="><tle>Save this story</tle><path class="in-bookmark-fill" d="M20 23.9508L12.5 19.7312L5 23.9508V2.95081H14V3.93211H6V22.1845L12.5 18.5536L19 22.1845V8.83866H20V23.9508Z"></path><path class="in-bookmark-fill" d="M23 3H20V0H19V3H16V4H19V7H20V4H23V3Z"></path></svg></span><span class="BaseWrap-sc-gjQpdd BaseText-ewhhUZ ActnBarButtonText-bYXYuh iUEiRd bkefvo gkccfO">Save this story</span></button></div></div></div><div class="LightboxWrapper-dxsWBV hhylRt"><div class="ArticlePageChunksContent-etcMtP bwyLBj"><div data-ttid="ArticlePageChunks" class="ArticlePageChunks-fLyCVG Uozmo"><div class="GridWrapper-cAzTTK kHBDeH grid grid-margs grid-ems-2 ArticlePageChunksGrid-hfxa bjczjj grid-layout--adrail narrow wi-adrail"><div class="GridItem-buujkM stRKV grid--em grid-layout__ntent"><div class="BodyWrapper-kufPGa EOneK body body__ntaer article__body" data-journey-hook="client-ntent" data-ttid="BodyWrapper"><div class="body__ner-ntaer"><figure data-ttid="IameEmbed" class="IameEmbedWrapper-sc-dRedg cjyRVU iame-embed"><div data-ttid="IameEmbedContaer" class="IameEmbedContaer-hptgUZ fXVBaX"><div class="IameEmbedAspectRatWrapper-hFVJps BKpgQ"><iame class="IameEmbedContent-cMdiev csnuAY IameEmbedContent lazyload" height="90" width="100%" sandbox="allow-scripts allow-same-orig allow-popups" tle="Embedd Frame" data-src=" allowfullscreen="" allow="toplay *; encrypted-media *; clipboard-wre; toplay; fullscreen; picture--picture"></iame></div></div></figure><p class="has-dropp has-dropp__lead-standard-headg paywall">I met <a href=">Aun</a> late his life and me—at an age when the easy, knowledgeable timacy of iendships formed one’s youth n no longer be attaed, bee not enough life is left, or expected to be left, to share wh another. Th, we were very good iends but not timate iends. Moreover, there was a rerve him that disuraged faiary—not that I tted , ever. I rather gladly rpected as the necsary secretivens of the great poet, one who mt have tght himself early not to talk prose, loosely and at random, of thgs that he knew how to say much more satisfactorily the nnsed ncentratn of poetry. Reticence may be the <em>déformatn profsnnelle</em> of the poet. In Aun’s se, this seemed all the more likely bee much of his work, utter simplicy, arose out of the spoken word, out of idms of everyday language—like “Lay your sleepg head, my love, Human on my fahls arm.” This kd of perfectn is very rare; we fd some of the greatt of <a href=">Goethe</a>’s poems, and mt exist most of Phk’s works, bee their hallmark is that they are untranslatable. The moment poems of this kd are wrenched om their origal abo, they disappear a cloud of banaly. Here all pends on the “fluent gtur” “elevatg facts om the prosaic to the poetic”—a pot that the cric <a href=">Clive Jam</a> strsed his say on Aun <em>Commentary</em> December, 1973. Where such fluency is achieved, we are magilly nvced that everyday speech is latently poetic, and, tght by the poets, our ears open up to the te mysteri of language. The very untranslatabily of one of Aun’s poems is what, many years ago, nvced me of his greatns. Three German translators had tried their luck and killed mercilsly one of my favore poems, “If I Could Tell You” (“<a data-offer-url=" class="external-lk" data-event-click="{"element":"ExternalLk","outgogURL":"" href=" rel="nofollow noopener" target="_blank">Collected Shorter Poems 1927-1957</a>”), which aris naturally om two lloquial idms—“Time will tell” and “I told you so”:</p><blockquote class="BlockquoteEmbedWrapper-sc-SdiGL jPeLne paywall blockquote-embed"><div class="BlockquoteEmbedContent-RbGs gmbtPx blockquote-embed__ntent"><p>Time will say nothg but I told you so.<br/>Time only knows the price we have to pay;<br/>If I uld tell you I would let you know.</p></div></blockquote><blockquote class="BlockquoteEmbedWrapper-sc-SdiGL jPeLne paywall blockquote-embed"><div class="BlockquoteEmbedContent-RbGs gmbtPx blockquote-embed__ntent"><p>If we should weep when clowns put on their show,<br/>If we should stumble when micians play,<br/>Time will say nothg but I told you so. . . .</p></div></blockquote><blockquote class="BlockquoteEmbedWrapper-sc-SdiGL jPeLne paywall blockquote-embed"><div class="BlockquoteEmbedContent-RbGs gmbtPx blockquote-embed__ntent"><p>The wds mt e om somewhere when they blow,<br/>There mt be reasons why the leav y;<br/>Time will say nothg but I told you so. . . .</p></div></blockquote><blockquote class="BlockquoteEmbedWrapper-sc-SdiGL jPeLne paywall blockquote-embed"><div class="BlockquoteEmbedContent-RbGs gmbtPx blockquote-embed__ntent"><p>Suppose the lns all get up and go,<br/>And all the brooks and soldiers n away;<br/>Will Time say nothg but I told you so?<br/>If I uld tell you I would let you know.</p></div></blockquote><p class="has-dropp has-dropp__lead-standard-headg paywall">I met Aun the tumn of 1958, but I had seen him before, the late forti, at a publisher’s party. Although we exchanged not a word on that ocsn, I had remembered him que well—a nice-lookg, well-drsed, very English gentleman, iendly and relaxed. I did not regnize him ten years later, for now his face was marked by those famo ep wrkl, as though life self had leated a kd of face-spe to make manift “the heart’s visible furi.” If you listened to him, nothg uld seem more ceptive than this appearance. Time and aga, when, to all appearanc, he uld not pe anymore, when his slum apartment was so ld that the plumbg no longer functned and he had to e the toilet the liquor store at the rner, when his su (no one uld nvce him that a man need at least two sus, so that one uld go to the cleaner, or two pairs of sho, so that one pair uld be repaired: a subject of an endls ongog bate between throughout the years) was vered wh spots or worn so th that his troers would sudnly spl om top to bottom— brief, whenever disaster h before your very ey, he would beg to more or ls tone an utterly idsyncratic versn of “Count your blsgs.” Sce he never talked nonsense or said somethg obvly silly—and sce I always remaed aware that this was the voice of a very great poet— took me years to realize that his se was not appearance that was ceptive, and that was fatally wrong to ascribe what I saw of his way of life to the harmls eccentricy of a typil English gentleman.</p><p class="paywall">I fally saw the misery, and somehow realized vaguely his pellg need to hi behd the “Count your blsgs” lany, yet I found difficult to unrstand fully why he was so miserable and was unable to do anythg about the absurd circumstanc that ma everyday life so unbearable for him. It certaly uld not be lack of regnn. He was reasonably famo, and such ambn uld anyhow never have unted for much wh him, sce he was the least va of all the thors I have ever met—pletely immune to the untls vulnerabili of ordary vany. Not that he was humble; his se was self-nfince that protected him agast flattery, and this self-nfince existed prr to regnn and fame, prr also to achievement. (Geofey Grigson, the <em>Tim Lerary Supplement</em>, reports the followg dialogue between the very young Aun and his tutor at Oxford. “Tutor: ‘And what are you gog to do, Mr. Aun, when you leave the universy?’ Aun: ‘I am gog to be a poet.’ Tutor: ‘Well— that se you should fd very eful to have read English.’ Aun: ‘You don’t unrstand. I am gog to be a great poet.’ ”) It never left him, bee was not acquired by parisons wh others, or by wng a race petn; was natural—ternnected, but not intil, wh his enormo abily to do wh language, and do quickly, whatever he pleased. (When iends asked him to produce a birthday poem for the next eveng at six o’clock, they uld be sure of gettg ; clearly this is possible only the absence of self-doubt.) But even this did not go to his head, for he did not claim, or perhaps even aspire to, fal perfectn. He nstantly revised his own poems, agreeg wh Valéry: “A poem is never fished; is only abandoned.” In other words, he was blsed wh that rare self-nfince which do not need admiratn and the good opn of others, and n even whstand self-cricism and self-examatn whout fallg to the trap of self-doubt. This has nothg to do wh arrogance but is easily mistaken for . Aun was never arrogant except when he was provoked by some vulgary; then he protected himself wh the rather abpt ns characteristic of English tellectual life.</p><p class="paywall">Stephen Spenr, the iend who knew him so well, has strsed that “throughout the whole velopment of [Aun’s] poetry . . . his theme had been love” (had not occurred to Aun to change Drt’ “<em>Cogo ergo sum</em>” by fg man as the “bubble-braed creature” that said “I’m loved therefore I am”?), and at the end of the addrs that Spenr gave memory of his late iend at the Cathedral Oxford he told of askg Aun about a readg he had given Ameri: “His face l up wh a se that altered s l, and he said: ‘They loved me!’ ” They did not admire him, they <em>loved</em> him: here, I thk, li the key both to his extraordary unhapps and to the extraordary greatns—tensy—of his poetry. Now, wh the sad wisdom of remembrance, I see him as havg been an expert the fe varieti of unrequed love, among which the furiatg substutn of admiratn for love mt surely have loomed large. And beneath the emotns there mt have been om the begng a certa animal <em>tristse</em> that no reason and no fah uld overe:</p><blockquote class="BlockquoteEmbedWrapper-sc-SdiGL jPeLne paywall blockquote-embed"><div class="BlockquoteEmbedContent-RbGs gmbtPx blockquote-embed__ntent"><p>The sir of the heart are as crooked as rkscrews,<br/> Not to be born is the bt for man;<br/>The send-bt is a formal orr,<br/> The dance’s pattern; dance while you n.</p></div></blockquote><p class="paywall">So he wrote “Death’s Echo,” “<a data-offer-url=" class="external-lk" data-event-click="{"element":"ExternalLk","outgogURL":"" href=" rel="nofollow noopener" target="_blank">Collected Shorter Poems</a>.” When I knew him, he would not have mentned the bt any longer, so firmly had he opted for the send-bt, the “formal orr,” and the rult was what Chter Kallman has so aptly named “the most dishevelled child of all disciplarians.” I thk was this <em>tristse</em> and s “dance while you n” that ma Aun feel so much attracted to and almost at home the famo Berl of the twenti, where <em>rpe diem</em> was practiced nstantly many variatns. He once mentned as a “disease” his early “addictn to German ag,” but much more proment than the, and ls easy to get rid of, was the obv fluence of Bertolt Brecht, wh whom I thk he had more mon than he was ever ready to adm. (In the late fifti, wh Chter Kallman, he translated Brecht’s “<a data-offer-url=" class="external-lk" data-event-click="{"element":"ExternalLk","outgogURL":"" href=" rel="nofollow noopener" target="_blank">Rise and Fall of the Cy of Mahagonny</a>”—a translatn that was never published, prumably bee of pyright difficulti. To this day, I know of no other aquate renrg of Brecht to English.) In merely lerary terms, Brecht’s fluence n easily be traced Aun’s ballads—for stance, the late, marvello “<a href=">Ballad of Barnaby</a>,” the tale of the tumbler who, havg grown old and p, “honoured the Mother-of-God” by tumblg for her; or the early “ltle story / About Miss Edh Gee; / She lived Clevedon Terrace / At Number 83.” What ma this fluence possible was that they both belonged to the post-First World War generatn, wh s cur mixture of spair and <em>joie vivre</em>, s ntempt for nventnal s of behavr, and s penchant for “playg ol,” which exprsed self England, I spect, the wearg of the mask of the snob, while exprsed self Germany a wispread pretense of wickedns, somewhat the ve of Brecht’s “The Threepenny Opera.” (In Berl, one joked about this fashnable verted hypocrisy, as one joked about everythg: “<em>Er geht böse über n Kurfürstendamm</em>”—meang, “That is probably all the wickedns he is pable of.” After 1933, I thk, nobody joked about wickedns anymore.)</p><p class="paywall">In the se of Aun, as the se of Brecht, verted hypocrisy served to hi an irristible clatn toward beg good and dog good—somethg that both were ashamed to adm, let alone proclaim. This seems plsible for Aun, bee he fally beme a Christian, but may be a shock at first to hear about Brecht. Yet a close readg of his poems and plays seems to me almost to prove . Not only are there the plays “Der Gute Mensch von Sezuan” and “Die Heilige Johanna r Schlachthöfe” but, perhaps more nvcgly, there are the l right the midst of the cynicism of “<a data-offer-url=" class="external-lk" data-event-click="{"element":"ExternalLk","outgogURL":"" href=" rel="nofollow noopener" target="_blank">The Threepenny Opera</a>” :</p><blockquote class="BlockquoteEmbedWrapper-sc-SdiGL jPeLne paywall blockquote-embed"><div class="BlockquoteEmbedContent-RbGs gmbtPx blockquote-embed__ntent"><p><em>E guter Mensch se! Ja, wer wär’s nicht gern?</em><br/><em>Se Gut n Armen geben, wam nicht?</em><br/><em>Wenn alle gut sd, ist</em> Se <em>Reich nicht fern.</em><br/><em>Wer sässe nicht sehr gern </em> Seem <em>Licht?</em></p></div></blockquote><p class="paywall">What drove the profoundly apolil poets to the chaotic polil scene of our century was Robpierre’s “<em>zèle patissant</em>,” the powerful urge toward “<em>l malhrx</em>,” as distguished om any need for actn toward <em>public</em> happs, or any sire to change the world.</p><div data-attr-viewport-monor="le-recirc" class="le-recirc-wrapper le-recirc-observer-target-1 viewport-monor-anchor"></div><p class="paywall">Aun, so much wiser—though by no means smarter—than Brecht, knew early on that “poetry mak nothg happen.” To him, was sheer nonsense for the poet to claim special privileg or to ask for the dulgenc that we are so happy to grant out of sheer gratu. There was nothg more admirable Aun than his plete sany and his firm belief sany; his ey all kds of madns were lack of disciple—“Nghty, nghty,” as he ed to say. The ma thg was to have no illns and to accept no thoughts—no theoretil systems—that would bld you to realy. He turned agast his early leftist beliefs bee events (the Mosw trials, the Hler-Stal pact, and experienc durg the Spanish Civil War) had proved them to be “dishont”—“shamefully” so, as he said his foreword to the “Collected Shorter Poems,” tellg how he threw out what he had once wrten:</p><blockquote class="BlockquoteEmbedWrapper-sc-SdiGL jPeLne paywall blockquote-embed"><div class="BlockquoteEmbedContent-RbGs gmbtPx blockquote-embed__ntent"><p>    History to the feated<br/>may say alas but nnot help nor pardon.</p></div></blockquote><p class="paywall">To say this, he noted, was “to equate goodns wh succs.” He protted that he had never believed “this wicked doctre”—a statement that I doubt, not only bee the l are too good, too precise, to have been produced for the sake of beg “rhetorilly effective” but bee this was the doctre everybody believed durg the twenti and thirti. Then me the time when</p><blockquote class="BlockquoteEmbedWrapper-sc-SdiGL jPeLne paywall blockquote-embed"><div class="BlockquoteEmbedContent-RbGs gmbtPx blockquote-embed__ntent"><p>In the nightmare of the dark<br/>All the dogs of Europe bark . . .</p></div></blockquote><div><div class="ConsumerMarketgUnThemedWrapper-iUTMTf jssHut nsumer-marketg-un nsumer-marketg-un--article-mid-ntent" role="prentatn" aria-hidn="te"><div class="nsumer-marketg-un__slot nsumer-marketg-un__slot--article-mid-ntent nsumer-marketg-un__slot---ntent"></div><div class="journey-un"></div></div></div><blockquote class="BlockquoteEmbedWrapper-sc-SdiGL jPeLne paywall blockquote-embed"><div class="BlockquoteEmbedContent-RbGs gmbtPx blockquote-embed__ntent"><p>Intellectual disgrace<br/>Star om every human face—</p></div></blockquote><p class="paywall">the time when looked for que a while as if the worst uld happen and sheer evil uld bee a succs. The Hler-Stal pact was the turng pot for the left; now one had to give up all belief history as the ultimate judge of human affairs.</p><div class="Contaer-bkChBi byNLHx"></div><p class="paywall">In the forti, there were many who turned agast their old beliefs, but there were very few who unrstood what had been wrong wh those beliefs. Far om givg up their belief history and succs, they simply changed tras, as were; the tra of Socialism and Communism had been wrong, and they changed to the tra of Capalism or Frdianism or some refed Marxism, or a sophistited mixture of all three. Aun, stead, beme a Christian; that is, he left the tra of History altogether. I don’t know whether Stephen Spenr is right assertg that “prayer rrpond to his ept need”—I spect that his ept need was simply to wre vers—but I am reasonably sure that his sany, the great good sense that illumated all his prose wrgs (his says and book reviews), was due no small measure to the protective shield of orthodoxy. Its time-honored herent meangfulns that uld be neher proved nor disproved by reason provid him, as had provid Chterton, wh an tellectually satisfyg and emotnally rather fortable refuge agast the onslght of what he lled “bbish;” that is, the untls folli of the age.</p><p class="has-dropp has-dropp__lead-standard-headg paywall">Rereadg Aun’s poems chronologil orr and rememberg him the last years of his life, when misery and unhapps had grown more and more unbearable whout, however, the least touchg eher the dive gift or the blsed facily of the talent, I have bee surer than ever that he was “hurt to poetry” even more than Yeats (“Mad Ireland hurt you to poetry”), and that, spe his sceptibily to passn, public polil circumstanc were not necsary to hurt him to poetry. What ma him a poet was his extraordary facily wh and love for words, but what ma him a great poet was the unprottg willgns wh which he yield to the “curse” of vulnerabily to “human _un_succs” on all levels of human existence—vulnerabily to the crookedns of the sir, to the fili of the heart, to the jtic of the world.</p><blockquote class="BlockquoteEmbedWrapper-sc-SdiGL jPeLne paywall blockquote-embed"><div class="BlockquoteEmbedContent-RbGs gmbtPx blockquote-embed__ntent"><p>Follow, poet, follow right<br/>To the bottom of the night,<br/>Wh your unnstrag voice<br/>Still persua to rejoice;</p></div></blockquote><blockquote class="BlockquoteEmbedWrapper-sc-SdiGL jPeLne paywall blockquote-embed"><div class="BlockquoteEmbedContent-RbGs gmbtPx blockquote-embed__ntent"><p>Wh the farmg of a verse<br/>Make a veyard of the curse,<br/>Sg of human unsuccs<br/>In a rapture of distrs;</p></div></blockquote><blockquote class="BlockquoteEmbedWrapper-sc-SdiGL jPeLne paywall blockquote-embed"><div class="BlockquoteEmbedContent-RbGs gmbtPx blockquote-embed__ntent"><p>In the serts of the heart<br/>Let the healg founta start,<br/>In the prison of his days<br/>Teach the ee man how to praise.</p></div></blockquote><p class="paywall">Praise is the key word of the l, not praise of “the bt of all possible worlds”—as though were up to the poet (or the philosopher) to jtify God’s creatn—but praise that pch self agast all that is most unsatisfactory man’s ndn on this earth and sucks s own strength om the wound: somehow nvced, as the bards of ancient Greece were, that the gods sp unhapps and evil thgs toward mortals so that they may be able to tell the tal and sg the songs.</p><blockquote class="BlockquoteEmbedWrapper-sc-SdiGL jPeLne paywall blockquote-embed"><div class="BlockquoteEmbedContent-RbGs gmbtPx blockquote-embed__ntent"><p>I uld (which you nnot)<br/>Fd reasons fast enough<br/>To face the sky and roar<br/>In anger and spair<br/>At what is gog on,<br/>Demandg that name<br/>Whoever is to blame:<br/>The sky would only wa<br/>Till all my breath was gone<br/>And then reerate<br/>As if I wasn’t there<br/>That sgular mand<br/>I do not unrstand,<br/><em>Bls what there is for beg</em>,<br/>Which has to be obeyed, for<br/>What else am I ma for,<br/>Agreeg or disagreeg?</p></div></blockquote></div></div></div><div class="GridItem-buujkM fVLMby grid--em grid-layout__asi"><asi class="PersistentAsiWrapper-VGrR daRVRt persistent-asi" style="posn:absolute;top:to;height:to" data-ttid="PersistentAsiWrapper"><div class="StickyBoxWrapper-jfYB jxBcTH sticky-box"><div class="StickyBoxPrimary-dzWDWL cdhYoN sticky-box__primary"><div class="AdWrapper-dQtivb fZrssQ ad ad--rail"><div class="ad__slot ad__slot--rail" data-no-id="loaemq"></div></div><div class="ConsumerMarketgUnThemedWrapper-iUTMTf jssHut nsumer-marketg-un nsumer-marketg-un--display-rail" role="prentatn" aria-hidn="te"><div class="nsumer-marketg-un__slot nsumer-marketg-un__slot--display-rail"></div><div class="journey-un"></div></div></div><div class="StickyBoxPlaceholr-grPmrg dxAvXx"></div></div></asi></div></div><div class="RowWrapper-UmqTg HEhan full-bleed-ad row-mid-ntent-ad"><div class="StickyMidContentAdWrapper-fSBzwl drzyIa ad-stickymidntent"><div class="AdWrapper-dQtivb fZrssQ ad ad--mid-ntent should-hold-space"><div class="ad__slot ad__slot--mid-ntent" data-no-id="23aqym"></div></div></div></div><div class="GridWrapper-cAzTTK kHBDeH grid grid-margs grid-ems-2 ArticlePageChunksGrid-hfxa bjczjj grid-layout--adrail narrow wi-adrail"><div class="GridItem-buujkM stRKV grid--em grid-layout__ntent"><div class="BodyWrapper-kufPGa EOneK body body__ntaer article__body" data-journey-hook="client-ntent" data-ttid="BodyWrapper"><div class="body__ner-ntaer"><p class="paywall">And the triumph of the private person was that the voice of the great poet never silenced the small but peratg voice of sheer sound mon sense whose loss has so often been the price paid for dive gifts. Aun never permted himself to lose his md—that is, to lose the “distrs” the “rapture” that rose out of :</p><blockquote class="BlockquoteEmbedWrapper-sc-SdiGL jPeLne paywall blockquote-embed"><div class="BlockquoteEmbedContent-RbGs gmbtPx blockquote-embed__ntent"><p>No metaphor, remember, n exprs<br/>A real historil unhapps;<br/>Your tears have value if they make gay;<br/><em>O Happy Grief!</em> is all sad verse n say.</p></div></blockquote><p class="paywall">It seems, of urse, very unlikely that young Aun, when he cid that he was gog to be a <em>great</em> poet, knew the price he would have to pay, and I thk entirely possible that the end—when not the tensy of his feelgs and not the gift of transformg them to praise but the sheer physil strength of the heart to bear them and live wh them gradually fad away—he nsired the price too high. We, any event—his dience, rears and listeners—n only be grateful that he paid his price up to the last penny for the everlastg glory of the English language. And his iends may fd some nsolatn his betiful joke beyond the grave—that for more than one reason, as Spenr said, “his wise unnsc self chose a good day for dyg.” The wisdom to know “when to live and when to die” is not given to mortals, but Wystan, one would like to thk, may have received as the supreme reward that the cel gods of poetry btowed on the most obedient of their servants. ♦</p><p class="paywall"><em>“Rememberg Wystan H. Aun, Who Died the Night of the Twenty-Eighth of September, 1973,” by Hannah Arendt. Copyright © 1975 by Hannah Arendt. Origally published the January 20, 1975, issue of The New Yorker. Reprted by permissn of Ge Borchardt, Inc., on behalf of the thor.</em></p></div></div></div><div class="GridItem-buujkM fVLMby grid--em grid-layout__asi"><div class="StickyBoxWrapper-jfYB jxBcTH sticky-box"><div class="StickyBoxPrimary-dzWDWL cdhYoN sticky-box__primary"><div class="AdWrapper-dQtivb fZrssQ ad ad--rail"><div class="ad__slot ad__slot--rail" data-no-id="j1rwoi"></div></div><div class="ConsumerMarketgUnThemedWrapper-iUTMTf jssHut nsumer-marketg-un nsumer-marketg-un--display-rail" role="prentatn" aria-hidn="te"><div class="nsumer-marketg-un__slot nsumer-marketg-un__slot--display-rail"></div><div class="journey-un"></div></div></div><div class="StickyBoxPlaceholr-grPmrg dxAvXx"></div></div></div></div></div><div class="GridWrapper-cAzTTK kHBDeH grid grid-margs grid-ems-2 PaywallInleBarrierWhWrapperGrid-fyrGfS kLQIUk grid-layout--adrail narrow wi-adrail"><div class="GridItem-buujkM stRKV grid--em grid-layout__ntent"><div class="body body__le-barrier article__body"><div class="ntaer ntaer--body"><div class="ntaer--body-ner"><asi class="PaywallInleBarrierWrapper-iBnuqk lfXXa-D" data-ttid="PaywallInleBarrierWrapper"><div class="ConsumerMarketgUnThemedWrapper-iUTMTf jssHut nsumer-marketg-un nsumer-marketg-un--paywall-le-barrier" role="prentatn" aria-live="pole" aria-hidn="te"><div class="nsumer-marketg-un__slot nsumer-marketg-un__slot--paywall-le-barrier"></div><div class="journey-un"></div></div></asi></div></div></div></div></div></div></div><div class="GridWrapper-cAzTTK kHBDeH grid grid-margs grid-ems-2 ContentWrapperGrid-fvkmBv brYtrA grid-layout--adrail narrow wi-adrail"><div class="GridItem-buujkM stRKV grid--em grid-layout__ntent"><div class="body body__ntaer"><div class="ntaer ntaer--body"><div class="ntaer--body-ner"></div></div></div></div></div></div></article><div class="ContentFooterWrapper-jVNdRG dTJkpP ArticlePageContentFooterGrid-ccsXYy eMZRHU article-body__footer"><div class="GridWrapper-cAzTTK kHBDeH grid grid-margs grid-ems-2 grid-layout--adrail narrow wi-adrail"><div class="GridItem-buujkM stRKV grid--em grid-layout__ntent"><footer class="ContentFooterMagazeDisclaimer-gzKAqo iZIuUU" data-ttid="MagazeDisclaimerWrapper">Published the prt edn of the <a href="/magaze/1975/01/20" data-reactroot="">January 20, 1975</a>, issue.</footer></div></div><div class="RowWrapper-UmqTg HEhan"><div class="GridWrapper-cAzTTK kHBDeH grid grid-margs grid-ems-2 grid-layout--adrail narrow wi-adrail"><div class="GridItem-buujkM stRKV grid--em grid-layout__ntent"></div></div></div><div class="RowWrapper-UmqTg HEhan"><div class="GridWrapper-cAzTTK kHBDeH grid grid-margs grid-ems-2 grid-layout--adrail narrow wi-adrail"><div class="GridItem-buujkM stRKV grid--em grid-layout__ntent"><div class="ContributorsWrapper-eNpWFu GWFsc ntributors" data-ttid="Contributors"><div class="ContributorBWrapper-bnVHbt gMon"><div class="ContributorBContent-ubQdr jZTSSi"><div class="ContributorBHear-ledood XOIEx"></div><div class="ContributorBB-fBolsO giFhKz"><a href="/ntributors/hannah-arendt">Hannah Arendt</a>, the thor of “<a href=">The Origs of Totalarianism</a>,” died 1975. Her earlit reportg for The New Yorker beme the 1963 book “<a href=">Eichmann Jesalem: A Report on the Banaly of Evil</a>.”</div><div class="ContributorBFooter-brqDlv ezUmSv"></div></div></div></div></div></div></div><div class="RowWrapper-UmqTg HEhan"><div class="GridWrapper-cAzTTK kHBDeH grid grid-margs grid-ems-2 grid-layout--adrail narrow wi-adrail"><div class="GridItem-buujkM stRKV grid--em grid-layout__ntent"><div data-ttid="TagCloudWrapper" class="TagCloudWrapper-gGgndx ctyZyK ContentFooterTagCloud-krQmRG ZLGh"><span class="BaseWrap-sc-gjQpdd BaseText-ewhhUZ TagCloudSectnHear-cOforY iUEiRd bPyAoD kQQRmu">More:</span><a href="/tag/w-h-n" class="BaseWrap-sc-gjQpdd BaseText-ewhhUZ BaseLk-eNWuiM TagCloudLk-kvjZFu iUEiRd ggMZaT gFob hIhJOI"><span class="BaseWrap-sc-gjQpdd BaseText-ewhhUZ TagCloudName-eAUnLd iUEiRd gwIVBQ bUkXwu">W. H. 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