Selected Poems of Stephen Spender

by Stephen Spender

  Fathoms above the shadowy sea floor,

  These suck up from the depths black sands

  Which, risen, spread over all the surface

  While the storm roars against the headlands.

  Now, of the house of Oedipus, that hope

  Which was the last extension of the root,

  That light which promised so much is put out,

  By bloodstained dust that was a debt

  Unpaid to the infernal gods,

  And by a young girl’s frenzied heart.

  About the Author

  Stephen Spender was born in 1909 and was educated at University College, Oxford, where his friends included W. H. Auden, C. Day Lewis, Louis MacNeice, Christopher Isherwood and Edward Upward. His first book, Poems, was published by T. S. Eliot at Faber in 1933. He went to Spain during the civil war and worked as a Republican propagandist. With Cyril Connolly he founded Horizon in London in 1939, and co-edited it until he joined the National Fire Service in 1942. He founded Encounter with Irving Kristol in 1953 and was co-editor of the magazine until 1965. He spent much time in the USA where he was visiting professor at several universities. He was awarded the Queen’s Gold Medal for Poetry in 1971, and was knighted in 1983. His oeuvre includes numerous volumes of poems concluding with Dolphins in 1994, plays, translations, novels, short stories, essays on art and literature, criticism, and journals. He died in London in 1995.

  By the Same Author

  Collected Poems

  Copyright

  First published in 2009

  by Faber and Faber Ltd

  Bloomsbury House

  74–77 Great Russell Street

  London WC1B 3DA

  This ebook edition first published in 2015

  All rights reserved

  Poems © The Estate of Stephen Spender, 2009

  Preface © Grey Gowrie, 2009

  The right of Stephen Spender to be identified as author of this work has been asserted in accordance with Section 77 of the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988

  The right of Grey Gowrie to be identified as editor of this work has been asserted in accordance with Section 77 of the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988

  Cover: Series design by Pentagram

  This ebook is copyright material and must not be copied, reproduced, transferred, distributed, leased, licensed or publicly performed or used in any way except as specifically permitted in writing by the publishers, as allowed under the terms and conditions under which it was purchased or as strictly permitted by applicable copyright law. Any unauthorised distribution or use of this text may be a direct infringement of the author’s and publisher’s rights, and those responsible may be liable in law accordingly

  ISBN 978–0–571–26451–3