Sea. Common Night. Forest. City. Mountain. Private Light. Desert.

February 1, 2013 10:35 AM

"From symbols and notions to literary and religious allusions, this chart contains [W.H.] Auden's view of the world (and of worlds beyond), at least as he envisioned it in the 1940s."

(Via Lazenby, one of the best blogs going. Their post features a more readable preparation of the transcribed chart.)

posted by Iridic (15 comments total)

I'm feeling the particular kind of dumb I felt when I was back in that Irish lit course I took in college where the professor tried to teach us something about pre-Christian literature by trying to get us all to think like Druids.
posted by EmpressCallipygos at 10:40 AM on February 1, 2013

Wow, great find.
posted by gwint at 10:40 AM on February 1, 2013

"My seminar on Romanticism starts tomorrow. Quakers or no Quakers, I shall serve bread and cheese and beer at four o'clock."

This is pretty funny; the only college class I can recall the professor bringing in food (bagels and cream cheese, no beer, unfortunately) was Modern British Poetry.
posted by griphus at 10:51 AM on February 1, 2013

The cleaned up version is nice, but they left off his doodles of githyanki astral citadel layouts.
posted by fleacircus at 10:58 AM on February 1, 2013

Does the "Quakers or no Quakers" line refer to the fact that beer was probably not allowed in Swathmore it being a dry town back then as it is now? Cuz that's badass.
posted by Potomac Avenue at 11:00 AM on February 1, 2013

What's "S.A."? As in: The Tragic Hero-Outlaw with S.A. and The Demonic Villian without natural S.A.?
posted by steef at 11:13 AM on February 1, 2013

What's "S.A."?

I suspect it stands for Sex Appeal.
posted by Iridic at 11:18 AM on February 1, 2013 [1 favorite]

i've been meaning to read Auden (the poetry) for some time now. I have his lectures on Shakespeare.
Can someone recommend a good volume with which to begin?
posted by OHenryPacey at 11:21 AM on February 1, 2013

So, right there at the bottom we have

                    PURGATORY.
     The Island.                    The Oasis.

Which is rather worrying, as it suggests that the final episode of Lost might not have been such a tacked-on cop-out as it appeared.
posted by titus-g at 11:47 AM on February 1, 2013

OHenryP, you probably couldn't go wrong starting with a copy of Selected Poems, the expanded edition. It's a "best of", presented in chronological order (Amazon link).
posted by steef at 12:46 PM on February 1, 2013 [1 favorite]

Whoa, you weren't kidding about the Lazenby blog. That's some pretty good stuff right there:

"people who were called intelligent are raised to believe in great strides. brilliance and insight. geniuses. but those never exist. there are only people willing to crawl for longer distances than the average person could tolerate."
posted by Doleful Creature at 1:10 PM on February 1, 2013 [1 favorite]

Yeah I'm superdigging that post about Infinite Jest too. Great blog.
posted by Potomac Avenue at 1:59 PM on February 1, 2013

There's a pretty good one about atheism vs. religion too, really quite a lovely bit of writing. And the post about going back in time to ask Lincoln if he was gay...seriously who is this Lazenby character?
posted by Doleful Creature at 2:03 PM on February 1, 2013

seriously who is this Lazenby character?

I recall but cannot find a post which credits two collaborators. You can tell who's on deck by whether the sentences are capitalized. Lazenby [is/are] evidently a Mefite.

As this is my third FPP spurred, directly or indirectly, by a Lazenby posting, a declaration of credit and regard is long overdue.
posted by Iridic at 2:39 PM on February 1, 2013

Yeah, wow, this lazenby tumblr just keeps punching me in the gut. Amazing. (The Auden chart is good too :) )
posted by rivenwanderer at 2:39 PM on February 1, 2013