The Auroras of Autumn
First edition | |
Author | Wallace Stevens |
---|---|
Country | United States |
Language | English |
Genre | Poetry |
Publisher | Alfred A. Knopf |
Publication date | September 1950 |
Media type | |
Preceded by | Transport to Summer |
Followed by | Collected Poems |
The Auroras of Autumn is a 1950 book of poetry by Wallace Stevens. The book of poems contains the long poem of 10 cantos by Stevens of the same name.
Contents
The book features a collection of poems containing also the 1948 Stevens long poem of the same name, whose title refers to the Aurora Borealis, or the "Northern Lights", in the fall.[1] The book collects 32 Stevens poems written between 1947 and 1950, and was his last collection before his 1954 Collected Poems.[2]
The long poem in the book which is titled "The Auroras of Autumn" is a 240-line poem divided into ten cantos of 24 lines each. It is considered one of Stevens' more challenging and "difficult"[3] works, and a 20th century example of the English Romantic tradition.[4] Another notable poem in the book is The Owl in the Sarcophagus, an elegy for Stevens' best friend, Henry Church.[5]
Awards
It won the 1951 National Book Award for Poetry.[6]
Notes
- ↑ "The Auroras of Autumn (Masterplots II: Poetry, Revised Edition)". eNotes.com. Retrieved May 14, 2010.
- ↑ Cook, Eleanor. A Reader's Guide to Wallace Stevens (Princeton University Press, 2007), p. 237.
- ↑ Unsworth, John. "An Echo of Baudelaire in 'The Auroras of Autumn'," American Literature vol. 60, #1 (Mar. 1988).
- ↑ Finch, Annie (October 28, 2009). "The Poetry of Autumn: Forget spring. Fall is the season for poetry,". Poetry Foundation.
- ↑ Bloom, Harold (1980). Wallace Stevens: The Poems of Our Climate. Cornell University Press. .
- ↑
"National Book Awards – 1951". National Book Foundation. Retrieved 2012-02-25.
(With acceptance speech by Stevens and essay by Katie Peterson from the Awards 60-year anniversary publication.)
References
- Beckett, Lucy. Wallace Stevens (Cambridge University Press, 1974).
External links
- Review of The Auroras of Autumn in The New York Times (September 10, 1950)
- Guest lecture focusing on the poem The Auroras of Autumn (part of Open Yale Courses).