The Age of Anxiety: A Baroque Eclogue (W. H. Auden: Critical Editions)
One ofChoice's Outstanding Academic Titles for 2011"[Auden's] most significant piece of work. . . . [W]e have in W. H. Auden a master musician of rhythm and note, unable to be dull, in fact an enchanter, under the magic of indigenous gusto . . . .The Age of Anxietyassures us that fear and lust have, in faith and purity, a cure so potent we need never know panic or be defeated by Self."--Marianne Moore,New York Times"[M]agnificent . . . . [and] enormously rich in allusion, sound, and intellectual power. . . . For pessimism and naturalism and virtuosity,The Age of Anxietymakes one think of Shakespeare'sTempest."--Jacques Barzun,Harper's Magazine"[An]emotionally stunning work. . . . [O]ne of the splendid poems of our language."--M. L. Rosenthal,New York Herald Tribune"Princeton University Press's new critical, annotated edition ofThe Age of Anxietyseeks to repair and renew contemporary readers' relationship with the poem. That it should triumphantly succeed in this task, however, has less to do with unraveling the poem's intricacies than with clearly showing how its many knots are tied. In an expansive preface and through rigorous textual notes, editor and Auden scholar Alan Jacobs outlines the circumstances of the poem's composition, traces the relations between psychology and religious belief as they play out in the text, and firmly situates the work in its historical moment. . . . It can only be hoped that this handsome new edition bringsThe Age of Anxietyto a new 'pitiful handful'. Those lucky few will discover in its pages one of the last century's great, and greatly neglected, poems."--Geordie Williamson,Australian"This new edition contains an elegant, unostentatious commentary by Alan Jacobs, an American professor whose previous books include a cultural history of Original Sin."--Richard Davenport-Hines,The Spectator"Elegantly printed, [The Age of Anxiety] is graced by [Alan] Jacobs's essay-length introduction, which traces the poem's evolution from the time Auden moved from Europe to the US in 1939 to its publication both in Britain (1947) and the US (1948)."--Choice"This new edition of Auden'sThe Age of Anxietyunder review here provides a timely occasion for the reconceptualization of the structures of the collective imagination in the era of global violence and viral media spectacle. Benefiting from Alan Jacob's revealing and comprehensive prefactory note, the volume invites concerted theoretical effort toward the configuration of a post-apocalyptic poetics."--Nigel Mcloughlin,ABC Studies