In the poem "Musee des Beaux Arts", written in the year, 1938 by W.H. Auden, the poet is clearly describing Pieter Brueguel's painting, "Fall of Icarus." Auden came across Pieter Brueghel's paintings in Brussels while he lived there for a year. He wrote a few poems about Brueghel's paintings and one of them includes the painting of the Fall of Icarus. Through various figures of speech, the poem examines human reaction or response to disaster. It describes how a great disaster can occur side by side with "ordinary" daily experiences. The poem considers the intense suffering of someone who tried desperately to achieve something great and failed; and the passive attitude of the people around the disaster.

Through the use of imagery, intense language and an ancient Greek myth, The Fall of Icarus, Auden relates not only the central themes of suffering and indifference, but also uses the...