Poems

Second revised edition – third overall impression. Tall octavo. 89pp. Publisher's beige linen cloth, pale blue lettering to spine. Rough-cut fore edges, top edge trimmed. Yellow dustwrapper, lettered in blue [priced 5s. net to front flap].

Following the legendary rarity of the 1928 edition of Poems – privately printed by Stephen Spender – Faber brought out a wrappered issue of this book dedicated to Christopher Isherwood in September of 1930. A case-bound Second Edition with some New Poems added, was re-issued in November of 1933. This August 1934 printing, is the first reprint of the latter, constituting therefore the third impression overall.

Board edges somewhat browned and soiled, prelims. and edges slightly foxed. Fragile d/w sustains a couple of closed tears; browned spine lightly chipped and worn at extremities, yet overall, a very nice copy.

A perfectionist and a firm believer in Valéry's dictum 'a poem is never finished, only abandoned', Auden kept on revising, recycling lines, and substituting new poems, with the 1976 issue of his Collected Poems retaining just four of the original twenty poems of the 1928 edition. The book's impact on British and Irish writers at the time, such as Christopher Isherwood and Cecil Day-Lewis, who shared similar political views was undeniable, with its adherents labelled the Auden generation.

[Bloomfield & Mendelson A2b]