Reimagining reality: The confluence of romantic heritage and the modernist imagination in the poetry of Wallace Stevens and W.H.Auden

Wallace Stevens and W.H. Auden, known as prominent figures of 20th-century poetry, are widely recognized for their unique use of language and exploration of complex philosophical themes. Among these themes, the concept of reality and its relation to creative imagination and neo-romanticism are central elements in their poetry. In their works, Stevens and Auden emphasize the importance of poetic imagination in creating new realities and obscuring the line between the objective world and the realm of imagination. They accomplish this by expertly manipulating words to build a distinctive poetic vision that rewrites accepted ideas of reality. Both geniuses deconstruct the conventional oppositions between reality and imagination by focusing on their new perspective, leading readers to reconsider their presumptions about what is real and merely imagined. Thus, with a particular focus on how they deconstruct and reimagine traditional notions of reality, this paper offers a detailed and critical analysis of the complexities of language and imagination within the framework of neo-romanticism by comparing Wallace Stevens and W.H. Auden.