Commentators have mentioned Auden's Marxism for so long now that his indebtedness to Marx threatens to become a critical commonplace through sheer repetition. Yet no one has ever shown that such indebtedness exists. In the 1930's merely to be young, socially conscious, and outspoken was enough to mark one as a Marxist, or at least a “leftist,” and Auden was all these things. But now that the 1930's have passed, and Auden has long since ceased to be either young or a “thirties poet,” the Marxist element in his work deserves a thorough investigation. I propose, therefore, to ask how much Marxism there is in Auden's poetry, where it is found, and what sort of thing it is. Since it is important to discover just how the pattern of his Marxist borrowings changes (if it does) through the years, the first question calls for a chronological examination of his work.