Fragments of Auden's poetry sold for £15,000

A newly discovered manuscript by D H Lawrence, consisting of four pages he rewrote for an Australian author, sold at auction in London yesterday for almost double their estimated price.

Fragments of early poetry by W H Auden also fetched almost three times their estimated price at the auction.

The Lawrence work, which sold for £7,820, is an adaptation of a typescript by Molly Skinner, a friend he stayed with during a visit to Australia. It was discovered by an expert from Phillips auction house in the estate of the late editor John Middleton Murray, and was estimated to fetch up to £4,000.

Impressed with Skinner's book on her experiences as a nurse, Lawrence encouraged her to write a novel on the first settlers. A year later, she sent him The House of Ellis. He completely rewrote it, with a new ending, renaming it The Boy in the Bush.

Felix Pryor, of Phillips, said of the newly found, never-published tale,The Hand: "I suddenly realised that the script was written in Lawrence's hand." Although the story is signed "M L Skinner", its first four pages are in Lawrence's style. Mr Pryor said: "The only physical clue to his participation lies in the handwriting. And it is not altogether surprising that the most arresting passage occurs in the first four pages, which are entirely in Lawrence's autograph."

The Auden fragments, a set of 23 extracts and poems, entitled Case Histories and written on the theme of Sigmund Freud's psychology, sold for £14,950 to the same private American buyer. Auden sent them to the Adelphi magazine for publication. All but two, though, were rejected.

Handwritten by Auden, the works have remained in the family of John Middleton Murray because the poet sent them with a note which said: "Will the enclosed rhymed psychology be of any use to you for the Adelphi?... Don't bother to return them if not."