Auden, Orwell and 'Spain'

Joan Miro, Aidez l'espagne ('Help Spain!')

George Orwell (author of 1984 and Animal Farm) was shot in the throat fighting for the Republic in Spain on the same day that W. H. Auden's poem, 'Spain', was published as a 5-page pamphlet to raise money for the Spanish Medical Aid Committee (20 May 1937). Orwell praised Auden's poem, describing it as “one of the few decent things that have been written about the Spanish war.” However, he criticized line 95 of the poem, "The conscious acceptance of guilt in the necessary murder", and Auden himself later changed the line (see the note in your anthology). In fact, Auden eventually suppressed the poem entirely, refusing to publish it in his collected poems. There's an interesting article here about the debate between the two men.

I'd highly recommend George Orwell's Homage to Catalonia, his record of his experiences fighting in the International Brigades in Spain during the civil war there. It's a book that made a profound impression on me when I was in my late teens, and a great read.