Ischia.it english

Wystan Hugh Auden was born in York, England, on February 21, 1907, his father was a doctor, his mother a nurse. He attended the universities of Oxford and at only the age of 23 published his first collection of poems, "Poems". Auden for a few years lived in Berlin, and returned to England in the 30s, where he practiced elementary school teacher and published his second collection of poems. In a few years he became the spokesman of the young English poets. Openly gay, of Marxist ideas, Auden, along with the American T. S. Eliot, S. Spender and other poets revolutionized poetry. Auden loved the musicality of verse and not surprisingly, the music was always his great passion. At the age of 28 married, to make them get British nationality, the intelligent and versatile Erika Mann, to whom he dedicated his third collection of poems. In '39 he left England to emigrate to the United States. A few years later he left the U.S. for Canada after the end of World War II lived between Italy and New York, where he had a second chair. Auden when he lived in Italy he came to Ischia. Immediately fell in love with the island and described in a fairytale the strong bond that kept him anchored to the island for ten years. In those years, the poet entertained cordial relations with the islanders gave them an organ for one of the many churches in Forio, the spell was broken in the late '50s, when the microtaxi, the "seicento" and "vespe" began to prevail on roads and mule tracks of the island communities. Auden, after winning the Feltrinelli Prize left Forio to take refuge in an Austrian village. He died in Vienna in 1973.