SOURCE: "The Rewards of Patience," in Partisan Review, Vol. IX, No. 4, July-August, 1942, pp. 336–40.

Often considered the poetic successor of W. B. Yeats and T. S. Eliot, Auden is also highly regarded for his literary criticism. As a member of a generation of British writers strongly influenced by the ideas of Karl Marx and Sigmund Freud, Auden considered social and psychological commentary important functions of literary criticism. As a committed Christian, he viewed art in the context of moral and theological absolutes. While he has been criticized for significant inconsistencies in his thought throughout his career, Auden is generally regarded as a fair and perceptive critic. In the following review, he praises Bogan's Poems and New Poems as a work of "permanent value" inspired by her personal experiences and not written for public taste.

"Genius has only an immanent teleology, it develops itself, and while developing itself this self-development...