Refugee Blues Refugee Blues "Refugee Blues" is a poem by W. H. Auden, written in 1939, one of a number of poems Auden wrote in the mid- to late-1930s in blues and other popular metres, for example the meter he used in his love poem "Calypso", written around the same time. The poem dramatizes the condition of Jewish refugees from Nazi Germany in the years before World War II, especially the indifference and antagonism they faced when seeking asylum in the democracies of the period. In some later editions of Auden's poetry, the poem is not identified by name but is the
The Ascent of F6 dedicated to Auden's geologist brother John Bicknell Auden who had taken part in an expedition near the Himalayan mountain K2. Auden personally invited Benjamin Britten to write the incidental music for the play. Britten composed the music in February 1937, the month of the play's first production, including a choral setting of "Stop all the clocks" (titled "Funeral Blues"). The play was first produced at the Mercury Theatre, London on 26 February 1937, with incidental music by Benjamin Britten conducted from the piano by Brian Easdale. Directed by Rupert Doone, the cast included William Devlin as Michael Ransom, Dorothy Holmes-Gore