Oxford Poetry: Oxford Poetry 1927

Oxford Poetry 1927

From Fairie to the Somme: 1910-1913 1914 1915 1916 1917 1918 1919 1920 1921 1922 1923
Into the Waste Land: 1924 1925 1926 1927 1928 1929 1930 1931 1932
New Age: 1936 1937
War and Movement: 1942-1943 1946:No 1 1946:No 2 1947 1948 1949 1950 1951 1952
The Fantasy: 1953 1954 1955 1956 1957 1959 1960
"Fortnightly": 1970:No 1 1970:No 2 1970:No 3
Magazine: I.1 I.2 I.3 II.1 II.2 II.3 III.1 III.2 III.3 IV.1 IV.2 IV.3
Fin de siècle: V.1 V.2 V.3 VI.1 VI.2 VI.3 VII.1 VII.2 VII.3 VIII.1 VIII.2 VIII.3 IX.1 IX.2
Rebound: X.1 X.2 X.3 XI.1

Back to Oxford Poetry 1926 * Forward to Oxford Poetry 1928 * Home

Published by Blackwell's x+48pp
edited by W. H. Auden, C. Day-Lewis
with Preface

OP 1927 was edited by Auden and Day Lewis during a short summer holiday at the New Inn, Appletreewick, in Yorkshire; they had only recently met. Day Lewis recalled that "Walking the moors there one day, we approached one of those dark walls which wind over the contours like strips of liquorice. A hundred yards from the wall, as if on a common impulse, we both began to run faster: at fifty or sixty yards, we broke into a trot, and we were sprinting all out over the last thirty yards or so. Arriving simultaneously at the wall, we gave each other an amused but also sheepish look." They also played leapfrog, if Day Lewis's 1960 account is to be believed, each writing alternate paragraphs of the Preface. This might explain why the second paragraph begins "On the other hand". Stephen Spender's memoir, "World Within World", cites the paragraph on a tripartite psychological problem as being typical of Auden's abstract thinking; Day Lewis claimed it was actually his, whereas the buffoonish passage about youth being a spiritual discipline was, according to Day Lewis, by Auden. We shall never know. At any rate the resulting preface, certainly the most quoted material ever to appear in Oxford Poetry, and which the authors (influenced perhaps by the topography) intended to stand comparison with Wordsworth's preface to the "Lyrical Ballads" was meant "in deadly earnest" notwithstanding "an insurance policy, in the form of deliberately portentous prose styles carrying pastiche to the edge of burlesque, against any risk of solemnity or self-importance." As to their contest, both graduated with miserably low marks and no evident prospects, and both later returned as Professor of Poetry.

W. H. Auden: Preface; Extract;

Norman Cameron, as J. N. Cameron: The Thespians of Thermopylae; Marine Lament; The Diver; Pretty Maids All in a Row; Virgin Russia; Decapitation of Is;

C. Day Lewis, as Cecil Day-Lewis: Preface; Transitional Poem (Part II);

Tom Driberg, as Thomas Driberg: Cottage Squalor; Transvaluation of All Values; Lonely Scholar; Panorama in Lilliput;

Wyndham Ketton-Cremer: Two Songs from a Play; To the New Icarus; Epitaph by Duke Theseus;

Louis MacNeice: (greek title); Harvest Thanksgiving; This Tournament;

Clere Parsons, as Clare Parsons: Paysages; Débācle; Fragment from a Broken Ecstasy;

Charles Plumb: The Welcome; Poem;

Ronald McNair Scott, as R. McN. Scott: From 'Journey of the Spirit';

Eric Schroeder, as E. Schroeder: Myself; Evening of June;

John Richmond Theobald, as J. R. Theobald: Man Commanding; Invocation of Daybreak to the Rising Poets;

Anthony Thorne: The Arabian Nights; Sera Libertas;

Geoffrey Tillotson: The Goat;

Rex Warner, as R. E. Warner: Lotos Eaters; Anakreontic; Nativity; Impression; Resolution;

Eric Walter White: Opposite the Chariot;

Anonymous = V. M. Allom: An Ornithological View of Existence;

Anonymous = Christopher Isherwood: Souvenir des Vacances;



			Oxford Poetry 1927 From Fairie to the Somme: 1910-1913 1914 1915 1916 1917 1918 1919 1920 1921 1922 1923 Into the Waste Land: 1924 1925 1926 1927 1928 1929 1930 1931 1932 New Age: 1936 1937 War and Movement: 1942-1943 1946:No 1 1946:No 2 1947 1948 1949 1950 1951 1952 The Fantasy: 1953 1954 1955 1956 1957 1959 1960 "Fortnightly": 1970:No 1 1970:No 2 1970:No 3 Magazine: I.1 I.2 I.3 II.1 II.2 II.3 III.1 III.2 III.3 IV.1 IV.2 IV.3 Fin de siècle: V.1 V.2 V.3 VI.1 VI.2 VI.3 VII.1 VII.2 VII.3 VIII.1 VIII.2 VIII.3 IX.1 IX.2 Rebound: X.1 X.2 X.3 XI.1 Back to Oxford Poetry 1926 * Forward to Oxford Poetry 1928 * Home Published by Blackwell's x+48pp edited by W. H. Auden, C. Day-Lewis with Preface OP 1927 was edited by Auden and Day Lewis during a short summer holiday at the New Inn, Appletreewick, in Yorkshire; they had only recently met. Day Lewis recalled that "Walking the moors there one day, we approached one of those dark walls which wind over the contours like strips of liquorice. A hundred yards from the wall, as if on a common impulse, we both began to run faster: at fifty or sixty yards, we broke into a trot, and we were sprinting all out over the last thirty yards or so. Arriving simultaneously at the wall, we gave each other an amused but also sheepish look." They also played leapfrog, if Day Lewis's 1960 account is to be believed, each writing alternate paragraphs of the Preface. This might explain why the second paragraph begins "On the other hand". Stephen Spender's memoir, "World Within World", cites the paragraph on a tripartite psychological problem as being typical of Auden's abstract thinking; Day Lewis claimed it was actually his, whereas the buffoonish passage about youth being a spiritual discipline was, according to Day Lewis, by Auden. We shall never know. At any rate the resulting preface, certainly the most quoted material ever to appear in Oxford Poetry, and which the authors (influenced perhaps by the topography) intended to stand comparison with Wordsworth's preface to the "Lyrical Ballads" was meant "in deadly earnest" notwithstanding "an insurance policy, in the form of deliberately portentous prose styles carrying pastiche to the edge of burlesque, against any risk of solemnity or self-importance." As to their contest, both graduated with miserably low marks and no evident prospects, and both later returned as Professor of Poetry. Contents W. H. Auden: Preface; Extract; Norman Cameron, as J. N. Cameron: The Thespians of Thermopylae; Marine Lament; The Diver; Pretty Maids All in a Row; Virgin Russia; Decapitation of Is; C. Day Lewis, as Cecil Day-Lewis: Preface; Transitional Poem (Part II); Tom Driberg, as Thomas Driberg: Cottage Squalor; Transvaluation of All Values; Lonely Scholar; Panorama in Lilliput; Wyndham Ketton-Cremer: Two Songs from a Play; To the New Icarus; Epitaph by Duke Theseus; Louis MacNeice: (greek title); Harvest Thanksgiving; This Tournament; Clere Parsons, as Clare Parsons: Paysages; Débācle; Fragment from a Broken Ecstasy; Charles Plumb: The Welcome; Poem; Ronald McNair Scott, as R. McN. Scott: From 'Journey of the Spirit'; Eric Schroeder, as E. Schroeder: Myself; Evening of June; John Richmond Theobald, as J. R. Theobald: Man Commanding; Invocation of Daybreak to the Rising Poets; Anthony Thorne: The Arabian Nights; Sera Libertas; Geoffrey Tillotson: The Goat; Rex Warner, as R. E. Warner: Lotos Eaters; Anakreontic; Nativity; Impression; Resolution; Eric Walter White: Opposite the Chariot; Anonymous = V. M. Allom: An Ornithological View of Existence; Anonymous = Christopher Isherwood: Souvenir des Vacances; Copyright Oxford Poetry 2000. Pictured above: Detail from "Parnassus" by Nicholas Poussin

Oxford Poetry 1927

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