World Within World: The Autobiography of Stephen Spender (Modern Library)

About this book

"In this book I am mainly concerned with a few themes: love; poetry; politics; the life of literature....I believe obstinately that if I am able to write with truth about what has happened to me this can help others....In this belief I have risked being indiscreet and I have written occasionally of experiences which seem strange to me myself and which I have not seen discussed else-where." So begins Stephen Spenders autobiography widely acclaimed as the twentieth centurys greatest memoir. Spender was one of his generations most celebrated poets a writer living at the intersection of literature and politics in Europe between the two world wars. His portraits of his friendsVirginia Woolf T. S. Eliot W. H. Auden W. B. Yeats and Christopher Isherwoodrender a romantic world of literary genius. Spender uses a poets language to create an honest and tender exploration of amity and the many possibilities of love. First published in 1951 World Within World simultaneously shocked and bedazzled the literary establishment for its frank discussion of Eros in the modern world. Out of print for several years this Modern Library edition includes a new Introduction by the critic John Bayley and an Afterword Spender wrote in 1994 describing his reaction to the charges that David Leavitt plagiarized this autobiography in a novel.