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The Collected Critical Heritage II comprises of 40 volumes covering nineteenth and twentieth century European and American authors.These volumes will be available as a complete set, mini boxed sets (by theme) or as individual volumes. This second set compliments the first 68 volume set of Critical Heritage published by Routledge in October 1995. The Critical Heritage series gathers together a large body of critical figures in literature.These carefully selected sources include: * contemporary reviews from both popular and literary media.In these students can read about how Lady Chatterly's Lover shocked contemporary reviewers or what Ibsen's Doll's House meant to the early women's movement * little-published documentary material such as diaries and correspondence - often between authors and their publishers and critics * significant pieces of criticism from later periods to demonstrate how an author's reputation changed over time. ... Read more

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A collection of 10 of W.H. Auden's love poems and cabaret songs from the 1930s. ... Read more

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WOW
I was extrememly excited to see this available!Auden's translation of the Eddas is excellent, and hard to come by cheaply. ... Read more

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The essays in this collection were written as reviews, mainly for The New York Review of Books and The New Yorker, on books by or about Alexander Pope, Vincent van Gogh, Thomas Mann, Virginia Woolf, Oscar Wilde, and A. E. Housman, or as introductions to editions of the classical Greek writers, the Protestant mystics, Shakespeare, Goethe, Kierkegaard, Tennyson, Grimm and Andersen, Poe, G. K. Chesterton, Paul Valéry, and others.Throughout, these prose pieces reveal the same wit and intelligence--as well as the vision--that sparked the brilliance of Auden's poetry. ... Read more

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"A Civilised Voice"
Just as W.H. Auden's verse of the 1930s came to define a specific poetic epoch (that of Spender, MacNeice, Day Lewis - the so-called "Auden generation"), so his body of essays and reviews has assumed an important place among the canon of literary criticism. Still, when we want a concise account of that troubling term "modernism" it is to Auden's "The Dyer's Hand" that we turn; his essays on Shakespeare remain among the best ever composed. The writings collected as "Forewords and Afterwords" serve to reinforce this status. Here Auden's great love of the written word (and of opera, too) is beautifully evinced. While a reasonable proportion of the essays deal with the Germans (Auden, after all, chose to live his final years in Austria), it is when he turns south, beyond the alps, that he is perhaps most interesting. I think it was Clive James who noted Auden's almost Bloomian fascination with Dante, and it is in "The Greeks and Us" (the opening essay of this volume) that we see this preoccupation with the Mediterranean emerge. Here Auden charts a wonderment with the Greeks which begins, as a boy, with the tales of Homer, flowers when one reads the tragedians, and is so inseparable from us that even today "everyone is born either a Platonist or an Aristotelian" (5). This essay - in its erudition, enthusiasm, in its thematic demands - then lays a groundwork from which all his other examinations grow. What is his essay on Kierkegaard but an affirmation of that need to "become fully conscious" (32) which he attributes to the Greeks? Even Wagner, "the greatest of the monsters", comes to embody someone "for better or worse, fully human" (32) when thought of in the terms he constructs in his first essay. Auden himself exemplifies that "civilsed voice" - refreshing, complete, humane, and which he associates with Pope - as he lays parts of the western literary tradition bare in "Forewords and Afterwords". Here his initial essay is a seed from which the others appear to grow, each representing a shoot - at once a departure but each feeding from the same root - on the same tree of human understanding.

A Learned and Thoughtful Collection by a Master
W.H. Auden was, of course, one of the 20th Century's greatest poets. This collection of essays, forewards and reviews illuminates his carefully thought out positions on poetry, literature, art, artists and religion. The book covers a period of over thirty years and the organization of the book is not chronological. Though this obscures the development of Auden's thoughts over time, it does serve as a useful almost biographical device. Beginning with the most esoteric discussions of Christian mysticism, the editor proceeds to go deeper and deeper into Auden himself, until he ends with a semi-autobiograhical account.Read in conjunction with the poetry, one feels sometimes that the poems do illustrate the philosophy more clearly than the prose, but notwithstanding, these essays are well worth reading. The essays on Goethe and Wagner are arresting insights about the relationship between the artist and his life that might startle those used to the conventional view of art derives from life. The format leads inevitably to repetition but the repetition is welcome as the concepts are often difficult and benefit from being brought forth in different contexts.

A wonderful review of spirituality
In the first half of the book, Auden has written a brilliant set of essays on Christian doctrine, thought and mysticism. The essays on Protestant Mysticism and Kierkegaard are worth the price of the entire volume. Thosewhose tastes run more to the literary will enjoy the bulk of the work. ... Read more

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In this series, a contemporary poet advocates a poet of the past or present whom they have particularly admired. By their selection of verses and by the personal and critical reactions they express, the selectors offer intriguing insight into their own work. ... Read more

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Contents...
Edited, with an introduction, by W. H. Auden

Sydney Smith, the most famous wit of his generation (1771-1845) and is an example of English liberlism at its best. Starting as a village curate with little income and no influential friends, he went to Edinburgh as a tutor, and joined with Jeffrey, Brougham and Horner in founding The Edinburgh Review. Happily married, he moved in 1803 to London, where he was introduced into the Holland House circle, the center of Whig society, of which he became a popular and admired firgure. At the age of 38, he was banished by a Tory government to a village parsonage.

Sydney Smith was born on June 3, 1771, in Woodford, Essex, England.

Contents:

The Peter Plymley Letters,
Methodism,
Persecuting Bishops,
Letter to the Bishops of London,
What is a Puseyite? (poem),
Letters to Archdeacon Singleton,
Letter to Lord Lansdowne,
Letter to Mrs. Beach,
Two Letters to M.H. Beach,
Letter to Francis Jeffrey,
Letter to The Farmer Magazine,
Advice to Parishioners,
A Little Moral Advice,
Letter to Lady Georgianna Morpeth (See this letter below.),
A Nice Person,
Letter to Messrs. Hunt & Clark, Booksellers,
Letter to ....Bedford, Esq.,
Game Laws,
Spring Guns and Man Traps,
Counsel for Prisoners,
Too Much Latin and Greek,
Female Education,
The Society for the Suppression of Vice
Chimney Sweepers,
"Locking In" on Railways (two letters),
Modern Changes,
Letter to Francis Jeffrey (extract),
Letter to John Allen (extract),
Letter to Lord Grey and Lady Grey (extract),
Letter to Mr. Swing,
Four Speeches on the Reform Bill,
Ballot,
America,
On American Debts.
Letter to Lady Morpeth:

Dear Georgiana,

Nobody has suffered more from low spirits than I have

so I feel for you. Here are my prescriptions.

1st..Live as well as you dare.

2nd...Go into the shower-bath with a small quantity of water at a temperature low enough to give you a slight sensation of cold.

3rd....Amusing books.

4th...Short views of human lifenot further than dinner or tea.

5th...Beas busy as you can.

6th...See as much as you can of those friends who respect and like you.

7th And of those acquaintances who amuse you.

8th Make no secret of low spirits to your friends, but talk of them freelythey are always worse for dignified concealment.

9th Attend to the effects tea and coffee produce upon you.

10th Compare your lot with that of other people.

11th Don't expect too much from human lifea sorry business at the best.

12th Avoid poetry, dramatic representations (except comedy), music, serious novels, melancholy sentimental people, and every thing likely to excite feeling or emotion not ending in active benevolence.

13th Do good, and endeavour to please everybody of every degree.

14th Be as much as you can in the open air without fatigue.

15th Make the room where you commonly sit, gay and pleasant.

16th Struggle by little and little against idleness.

17th Don't be too severe upon yourself, or underrate yourself, but do yourself justice.

18th Keep good blazing fires.

19th Be firm and constant in the exercise of rational religion.

20th Believe me, dear Georgiana, your devoted servant, Sydney Smith

... Read more

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A biography of W.H. Auden, which looks at his career as a poet, and also offers an insight into the personality of the private man behind the public reputation. First published in 1979. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (2)

Van Gogh, a man worth getting to know.
In his early years as an artist, Vincent Van Gogh vividly related his concept of art to his brother Theo in two separate letters from July of 1882, numbered 218 and 221. In this book of Vincent's letters, translated by W.H. Auden, these letters can be more carefully read than if I were to paraphrase or quote bits and pieces here. His letters are a portal into the mind of a great artist and a misunderstood man. While there are more complete books of Van Goghs writings available, this collection gets to the core of Vincent as a man and as an artist.
Vincent was not some wacko who cut off part of his ear and shot himself from insanity, he was rather, a deeply caring man, a genius who observed life so far over the heads of the so-called art experts that they could not see his vision. I did not become a lover of Vincent's art work until after I had read this book of his letters and was able to see more clearly what he was conveying on canvas. I have admired Auden as a poet for many years and this translation of his is far more readable than other translations I have read since. For anyone who has ever admired Van Gogh's paintings, this book is a must read, but for anyone who has seen them and not appreceiated his perception of the world, read this book and you will change your mind and your heart as well. You might even come to understand and love this great man's artwork. JJ

An excellent selection of letters
The British poet WH Auden has compiled a wonderful selection from Van Gogh'sletters. Auden makes his selection..."What," I asked myself, "is the single most important fact about Von Gogh?" To that there seemed only one answer - "That he painted pictures". Hence the selection focuses on those letters which contain his reflections on the art of painting and the problems of being a painter. Other letters, eg to his father and brother, are included as they throw light upon Van Gogh's career as a painter. Also included are descriptions of VG by his acquaintances, 40 illustrations and a brief biography by his nephew. Of interest to artists as well as admirers of Van Gogh's works. ... Read more

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The Body in the Library is a unique tour of the history of medicine and its practitioners. It provides a nuanced and realistic picture of how medicine and society have abetted and thwarted each other ever since the lawyers behind the French Revolution banished the clergy and replaced them with doctors, priests of the body.

Ranging from Charles Dickens to Oliver Sacks, Anton Chekhov to Raymond Queneau, Fanny Burney to Virginia Woolf, Miguel Torga to Guido Ceronetti, The Body in the Library is an anthology of poems, stories, journal entries, Socratic dialogue, table-talk, clinical vignettes, aphorisms, and excerpts written by doctor-writers themselves.

Engaging and provocative, philosophical and instructive, intermittently funny and sometimes appalling, this anthology sets out to stimulate and entertain. With an acerbic introduction and witty contextual preface to each account, it will educate both patients and doctors curious to know more about the historical dimensions of medical practice.

Armed with a first-hand experience of liberal medicine and knowledge of several languages, Iain Bamforth has scoured the literatures of Europe to provide a well-rounded and cross-cultural sense of what it means to be a doctor entering the twenty-first century. A book for every bedside. ... Read more

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This is the first volume in a new series on the work of poet W.H. Auden. It includes a large amount of unpublished material by Auden, notably six poems written in German in the early 1930s, translated by the poet and David Constantine, and the complete version of his important early essay, "Writing," with a new foreword by its original editor, Naomi Mitchinson. Substantial selections from Auden's letters to Stephen Spender, E.R. Dodds, and Mrs. Dodds are presented with full annotation. Including essays about Auden, his mentors, and contemporaries by leading scholars in the field, and advice on collecting Auden's works, Auden Studies is indispensable for students, bibliophiles, and general readers interested in the great poet and his fellow writers. ... Read more