‘He was my personal North, my Southern area, my East and you may West’ is actually a line to what could be W. H. Auden’s best-recognized poem, ‘Funeral service Blues’ (because it’s sometimes known) or ‘End all the clocks’ (as it is sometimes known, following its beginning words). But what is the concept of it line, and you can Auden’s poem overall?
Auden’s poem are a keen elegy: an excellent poem discussing someone who has passed away. The fresh new range ‘He had been my personal Northern, my personal Southern area, my Eastern and you can West’ shows the brand new breadth away from his effect and you will exactly how much the man meant to your: since northern, southern, east, and western cover all cardinal activities of your compass, ‘He was my personal Northern, my personal Southern, my East and you can West’ is yet another way of claiming, ‘he was my personal everything’ otherwise ‘he was everything in order to me’.
But there is however more to this poem than simply suits the interest. Auden’s poem is taken to a new audience if this is actually quoted completely regarding the 1994 flick Five Wedding events and you will a funeral. The fresh new rise in popularity of the movie, and also the star John Hannah’s moving discovering of your poem at the the fresh new ‘funeral’ of your own film’s term, contributed to Auden’s copywriter, Faber and you can Faber, providing a skinny brochure off Auden’s like poems (that have an image out-of Hugh Give, the latest film’s celebrity, instead of Auden towards the book’s defense!). One to thin collection are a top seller and you will broke publishing ideas to have a book away from poems wrote in britain.
The new poem’s 3rd stanza opens up into the line, ‘He had been my personal North, my personal Southern area, my personal East and you may West’. This stanza produces obvious that boy getting elegised try everything you toward poem’s speaker: irrespective of where he was, otherwise exactly what time it absolutely was, or just what time, the new dead man was the brand new speaker’s lifetime. Continue reading The poem’s presenter are spending tribute in order to men which the guy enjoyed
