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    Esej W.H Auden

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    Marta Safin
    The document discusses the relationship between poetry and paintings in representing abstract ideas. It analyzes W.H. Auden's poem "Musée des Beaux Arts" and S. Spender's "Icarus", noting how they both reference the Greek myth of Icarus and Daedalus. Pieter Bruegel the Elder's painting "Landscape with the Fall of Icarus" is a well-known visual representation of this myth that influenced Auden's poem. The document argues that as human thought developed more abstract ideas, the need arose to illustrate indefinable concepts through art forms like literature and paintings in order to understand them on a physical level.

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    Esej W.H Auden

    Uploaded by

    Marta Safin
    41 views2 pages
    The document discusses the relationship between poetry and paintings in representing abstract ideas. It analyzes W.H. Auden's poem "Musée des Beaux Arts" and S. Spender's "Icarus", noting how they both reference the Greek myth of Icarus and Daedalus. Pieter Bruegel the Elder's painting "Landscape with the Fall of Icarus" is a well-known visual representation of this myth that influenced Auden's poem. The document argues that as human thought developed more abstract ideas, the need arose to illustrate indefinable concepts through art forms like literature and paintings in order to understand them on a physical level.

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    The document discusses the relationship between poetry and paintings in representing abstract ideas. It analyzes W.H. Auden's poem "Musée des Beaux Arts" and S. Spender's "Icarus", noting how they both reference the Greek myth of Icarus and Daedalus. Pieter Bruegel the Elder's painting "Landscape with the Fall of Icarus" is a well-known visual representation of this myth that influenced Auden's poem. The document argues that as human thought developed more abstract ideas, the need arose to illustrate indefinable concepts through art forms like literature and paintings in order to understand them on a physical level.

    Copyright:

    © All Rights Reserved
    Download as DOCX, PDF, TXT or read online from Scribd
    Download as docx, pdf, or txt
    41 views2 pages

    Esej W.H Auden

    Uploaded by

    Marta Safin
    The document discusses the relationship between poetry and paintings in representing abstract ideas. It analyzes W.H. Auden's poem "Musée des Beaux Arts" and S. Spender's "Icarus", noting how they both reference the Greek myth of Icarus and Daedalus. Pieter Bruegel the Elder's painting "Landscape with the Fall of Icarus" is a well-known visual representation of this myth that influenced Auden's poem. The document argues that as human thought developed more abstract ideas, the need arose to illustrate indefinable concepts through art forms like literature and paintings in order to understand them on a physical level.

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    © All Rights Reserved
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    The function of paintings in W.H Auden’s Musée des Beaux Arts and S.

    Spender’s Icarus

    ‘Painting and poetry are similar in the way that they make absent things present’. -
    Tito Lessi once said. The question is, in fact, what the relationship between poetry
    and paintings to ‘absent things’ means. Supposedly, previously mentioned ‘absent
    things’ refer to all the abstract ideas and thoughts which were born in human mind －
    it also concerns everything which is a creation of the human thought; literature is one
    such product.
    Since the beginning of time, man’s mind has looked for the explanations for how the
    world and all phenomena surrounding man are functioning. In general, every abstract
    thought created by a human needed to be clarified in one way or another. Since people
    needed to understand certain events and ideas, they have created an efficient way to
    resolve it － simply, the way in which abstractions were presented was to illustrate it
    － art; it refers to both literature and paintings. One of the best examples of that
    phenomenon is Greek mythology, which contains collections of stories explaining
    certain ideas or thoughts. One of the most well-known and valued myths, it can be
    found ‘The myth about Icarus and Daedalus’. Not only does the text illustrate certain
    phenomena, but also it conveys values which are vital for many people and teaches a
    crucial lesson, on the other hand such ideas remain still in human brain.
    Furthermore, texts like Mythology are concepts which are used by countless
    generations of writers and are a basis for the intertextuality due to their versatility and
    popularity. Among many authors who used ‘The myth about Icarus and Daedalus’ as
    a theme of their works, we should mention W.H Auden’s Musée des Beaux Arts and
    S. Spender’s Icarus. Both poems refer to Icarus and his tragic story. When it comes to
    their connections with paintings, there were numerous portrayals of Icarus fall,
    however the most well-known is P. Breugel’s painting ‘Landscape with the Fall of
    Icarus’ － one of three paintings by Breugel referred to in Auden’s poem Musée des
    Beaux Arts. Moreover, due to its title the latter poem, in an obvious way, also refers to
    Breugel’s painting. The way in which reader perceives both poems is influenced by
    cultural aspects and closely linked to them, as the majority of people is familiar with
    the story of Icarus. Additionally, many people while reading the poems would
    strongly associate their content to the image presented by painting. As literature
    creates abstract ideas in humans’ mind and has an impact on human emotional state,
    there occurs natural need for people to experience such feelings physically; among
    many possible ways may be a visible impression of images and abstract thoughts in
    the mind, which in the case of poetry is even much more needed and welcomed, due
    to its enormous impact on human emotions, as W. H Auden wrote ‘Poetry is the clear
    expression of mixed feelings. Not only do paintings help to handle those feelings, but
    also they attempt to help discern them.
    Concluding, as human thought was developed, the more abstract ideas were invented.
    Thus, the natural need to understand it and illustrate what is indefinable has arisen. As
    literature belongs to abstract human thoughts - naturally, the need to understand it was
    one of the first which has developed.Poetry as the oldest form of literature and also
    one of the most demanding in the perception required physical representation. One of
    the examples may be portrayal of ‘The myth about Icarus and Daedalus’ by P.
    Breugel to whom Auden refers. As far as Spender’s poem is concerned, the reader is
    to associate it with the myth and its tangible adaptation transferred by the Breugel’s
    painting. Thus, although the abstract ideas are absent in physical world, the paintings
    can create a tangible way to experience the abstract ideas such as poetry in real life.

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