Tag Archives: W. H. Auden

9-11 and Auden’s “September 1, 1939”

By Robin Bates | Published: September 10, 2024

In which I examine why Americans turned to Auden’s “September 1, 1939” on September 11, 2001–and how the poem still offers us solace and hope in the face of Trumpism.

Posted in Uncategorized | Also tagged "September 1 1939", Donald Trump, Kamala Harris, World War II | Comments closed

Paul Celan on Fascism’s Horrors

By Robin Bates | Published: December 18, 2023

Paul Celan’s “Death Fugue,” about the Holocaust, reads differently during the Israel-Gaza conflict.

Posted in Uncategorized | Also tagged "September 1 1939", Death Fugue, Holocaust, Israel and Gaza, Paul Celan, World War II | Comments closed

Biden and Auden’s Unknown Citizen

By Robin Bates | Published: November 27, 2023

Auden’s “Unknown Citizen” looks better now than when the poet wrote the poem.

Posted in Uncategorized | Also tagged "Unknown Citizen", Donald Trump, Election 2024, Joe Biden, MAGA | Comments closed

Poems for Judaism’s High Holy Days

By Robin Bates | Published: September 9, 2023

Note: If you wish to receive, via e-mail, (1) my weekly newsletter or (2) daily copies of these posts, notify me at [email protected] and indicate which you would like. I promise not to share your e-mail address with anyone. To unsubscribe, send me a follow-up email. Sunday Rosh Hashanah, when Jews do a spiritual self-assessment and take upon […]

Posted in Uncategorized | Also tagged "Days of Awe", "In Memory of W. B. Yeats", Alicia Ostriker, High Holy Days, Rosh Hashanah | Comments closed

Empire of Light, Filled with Poetry

By Robin Bates | Published: April 27, 2023

The film “Empire of Light” is magical in part because of all the poetry recited.

Posted in Uncategorized | Also tagged "Death's Echo", "Trees", Alfred Lord Tennyson, Ali Fears Eats the Soul, Chariots of Fire, cinema, Empire of Light, In Memoriam, Philip Larkin, Rainer Werner Fassbinder, T.S. Eliot, Waste Land | Comments closed

Terrible Beauty Born from Easter 1916?

By Robin Bates | Published: April 21, 2023

Yeats’s “Easter, 1916” is a profound meditation on activism, including on the poet’s ambivalent feelings about Dublin’s Easter Rising.

Posted in Uncategorized | Also tagged "Easter 1916", David Mamet, Easter uprising, Irish independence, Maud Gonne, Paul Muldoon, Terrorism, William Butler Yeats | Comments closed

Was the Moon Landing Poetic? A Debate

By Robin Bates | Published: July 18, 2019

Friday As tomorrow will be the 50th anniversary of the lunar landing, I went looking for literature that marked the occasion. A useful New York Times article, written 20 years after the event, surveyed the field and alerted me to the two poems that I share today. Interestingly, not much was written, leading to the […]