From Library Journal
If we are to take Mendelson at his word in his preface to the controversial 1979 Selected Poems?he asserted that "the surest way to misunderstand Auden is to read him as the modernists' heir"?then the validity of "light" poetry as a category may not need questioning. Auden himself, Mendelson reminds us, titled a section in Another Time (1940) "Lighter Poems." But Mendelson is hardly taking authorial intention into account. He is again using texts (invoking the "claims of history," as he did in 1979) that do not reflect Auden's later, "conservative" revisions. And, as in Selected Poems, we are not shown where the variants might occur. What we do have, we are told, are those "immediately accessible" works (precluding the indisputably "light" but homoerotic "Uncle Henry"). Even the cover is to feature a picture of the younger Auden looking properly dizzy. This much can be said for the book: it is an inexpensive alternative to the Complete Works, the only other place many of the libretti can be found. Recommended only for introductory collections.?Steven R. Ellis, Pennsylvania State Univ. Libs.
Copyright 1995 Reed Business Information, Inc.

Product Description
W. H. Auden once defined light verse as the kind that is written by poets who are democratically in tune with their audience and whose language is straightforward and close to general speech.  Given that definition, the 123 poems in this collection all qualify; they are as accessible as popular songs yet have the wisdom and profundity of the greatest poetry.

As I Walked Out One Evening contains some of Auden's most memorable verse: "Now Through the Night's Caressing Grip," "Lullaby:  Lay your Sleeping Head, My Love," "Under Which Lyre," and "Funeral Blues."  Alongside them are less familiar poems, including seventeen that have never before appeared in book form.  Here, among toasts, ballads, limericks, and even a foxtrot, are "Song:  The Chimney Sweepers," a jaunty evocation of love, and the hilarious satire "Letter to Lord Byron."  By turns lyrical, tender, sardonic, courtly, and risqué, As I Walked Out One Evening is Auden at his most irresistible and affecting.

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Most Helpful Customer Reviews   Excellent Introduction , December 15, 2006 By  Prithvi Karthikeyan - See all my reviews    This slim volumne is exemplary of how quantity is not an appropriate indicator of poetic genius. I would consider this book 'Auden- Lite'and a very apt first volume of Auden's poetry. The volume has several of Auden's famous poems like 'Funeral Blues' of the Four Weddings and a Funeral fame and 'Lullaby'. While it doesn't do complete justice to Auden's spritual side it has plenty of doggerel verse including 'Jam Tart' and some very amusing short poems. Auden's versatility is very impressive and there is an almost Edwardian charm coupled with a strikingly modern sensibility that make this anthology very enjoyable.