Poets Reading Poetry: W.H. Auden

Poetry is meant to be read aloud, but rarely is. As Oscar Wilde once said, "A poet can survive everything but a misprint."

So, cutting out the middle man, here is where we'll post famous poets reading their own poetry--the words off the page and in your ears, as they intended. And hopefully nothing is lost in the process.




W.H. Auden is one of those poets and writers from history where the name looks familiar to the general population, but most have little idea what he actually wrote or why he's famous. He's the anti-Robert Frost. We all know "The Road Not Taken" by Frost, but what by Auden? If you know much, you associate a face worn and withered, and not a specific poem.

Auden won the Pulitzer for poetry in 1948. During his life, he wrote over 400 poems, while also delving into literary criticism and essays, of which he amassed another 400+ works. Born and educated in England, he became a naturalized American citizen in 1946, although his travels and work as a professor routinely took him around the world.

"The More Loving One" is a poem of unrequited love, of which Auden often experienced in his life. (He lived with his former lover platonically for the last 26-years of his life.) Even the stars tell him to go to hell in his poem, which really settles the matter. The voice he serves up during his reading is very British, firm but affected, and not obnoxiously royal, a sort of middle-class average tone expected of a man who was often disenfranchised, who smoked, and who was alone.


The More Loving One, by W.H. Auden

Looking up at the stars, I know quite well
That, for all they care, I can go to hell,
But on earth indifference is the least
We have to dread from man or beast.

How should we like it were stars to burn
With a passion for us, we could not return?
If equal affection cannot be,
Let the more loving one be me.

Admirer as I think I am
Of stars that do not give a damn,
I cannot, now I see them, say
I missed one terribly all day.

Were all stars to disappear or die,
I should learn to look at an empty sky
And feel its total dark sublime,
Though this might take me a little time.