How William Butler Yeats Irish Identity Shaped His Poetry

Romantic influences paint a calm and peaceful portrait of Ireland through a tranquil tone. The mood is pleasant in the “nod of the head” and “polite meaningless words” as the reader deduces a positive outlook on society. It explicitly contrasts the repetition of “a terrible beauty is born” when reflecting on the violence in Ireland, shaping a personal response influenced by his perception of a struggle diminishing the essence of a pleasant aforementioned society. The stone to the “troubled living stream” emphasises Yeats’ support for the movement by placing

William Butler Yeats is one of the most esteemed poets in 20th century literature and is well known for his Irish poetry. While Yeats was born in Ireland, he spent most of his adolescent years in London with his family. It wasn’t until he was a teenager that he later moved back to Ireland. He attended the Metropolitan School of Art in Dublin and joined the Theosophical Society soon after moving back. He was surrounded by Irish influences most of his life, but it was his commitment to those influences and his heritage that truly affected his poetry. William Butler Yeats’s poetry exemplifies how an author’s Irish identity can help create and influence his work.

Yeats works drew heavily on Irish mythology and history, he never fully embraced his Protestant past nor joined the majority or Ireland Roman Catholics but he devoted much of his life to the study in myriad other subjects. The Irish writer’s James O’ Grady and Sir William Ferguson were the most influential. Through his writing Yeats found his voice to speak up against the harsh nationalist policies of the time, his early dramatic works conveyed his respect for Irish legend and fascination with occult. Yeats mother was the first introduce him and his sisters to the Irish folktales he grew to love so much but little did you know that his brother jack and father was also an accomplished artist and they both helped William in his writing and it's the reason he found his own interest in the wonderful arts as he called them. In 1894 Yeats met friend and patron Lady Augusta Gregory and thus began their involvement with The Irish Literary Theatre which was founded in 1899 in Dublin. Along with literature, he also loved the theater and wrote several plays. He collaborated with the likes of Lady Gregory, Edward Martyn and George Moore to establish the Irish Literary Theatre for the purpose of performing Irish and Celtic plays. As a dramatist, his successful works included ‘The Countess Cathleen’ (1892), ‘The Land of Heart’s Desire’ (1894) and ‘The King’s Threshold’

In the first stanza Yeats expresses his conflicting loathing and admiration for modernity through the juxtaposition of “vivid faces” and “grey houses”. This represents the possibilities that modernity can bring; the revitalising of the community or the destruction of tradition and age old energy already lost by the modifications in the city. The repetition of the phrase “A terrible beauty is born” in the first and fourth stanzas articulate this inner turmoil revolving around modernity. This oxymoronic declaration is emphasised throughout the text by Yeats’ confusion towards the rebellion and its necessity. The fourth stanza embodies this conflict, removing the previously represented idea that life in pre-rebellion Ireland was a “casual comedy”, alluding to an Elizabethan play where the characters were content. By asking the rhetoric questions “was it needless death” and “O when may [British rule] suffice?” Yeats parallels the unresolved contradiction of “terrible beauty”. However, this sensitive treatment of conflict allows the retainment of ambiguity and can be related to any change within life, hence allowing audiences to superimpose their own beliefs and ideas into the poem. Yeats continues to explore his aversion towards modernism in The Second Coming with the appointment of a new “gyre” standing as the symbol for a new age. The fear of

William Butler Yeats, a multitalented individual won the Nobel Prize in 1923. Born the son of a well known Irish painter and religious skeptic had many influences in his life. Eventually, he converted to Paganism from Christianity. He is till this day considered one of the greatest poets that ever lived.

During the time in which Yeats was writing the poem, the world was in the midst of events like the First World War, Russian Revolution and political strife in his own country, Ireland. The first stanza in the poem represents this as Yeats captures and encourages the image of political unrest and confusion. It talks about the fall of family values, social structure, and religious disbelief. This is also represented in “September 1913,” another of Yeats poems, as he presents the changed in Irelands national identity. This first stanza also implies that the old rules no longer matter anymore and instead of rules there was confusion and chaos. The first too lines specifically is a metaphor that the world is spiralling out of control. The relationship

Yeats’ interest in rhythm was deeply tied to the notion of the sound of the earth and nature, and our relationship with the elements. He also had a profound interest and belief in faery, and the ways in which one could transcend material reality in order to reach that world which ran alongside the natural world. Yet Yeats, who was born in 1865 and died in 1939, lived through an era of immense scientific discovery and change. He lived in a world where, by and large, to believe in faery was to be irrational, and the industrial hum of engines prevailed over the quieter sounds of nature. In his earlier poetry, he conveys a certain reverence towards the ancient rhythms of language and nature, flying in the face of the frenetically busy London life he experienced as a young man. The bewitching beauty of the landscape of Sligo, steeped in folklore, were the true rhythms which brought on the ‘state of perhaps real trance’, allowing him to

By the beginning of 1925 Yeats's health was stabilized and “A Vision" had reached its final stages; finished. All of the trials and tribulation Yeats had faced gave Yeats a new outlook. "His language became more forceful; the Jesuit Father Peter Finlay was described by Yeats as a man of "monstrous discourtesy", and he lamented that, "It is one of the glories of the Church in which I was born that we have put our Bishops in their place in discussions requiring legislation"." (¶3 W.B. Yeats) In Yeats's old age his health wasn't the only thing failing, He was filled with distrust and despite to those of the Roman Catholics in Ireland. He steadily warned his associates, pleading: "If you show that this country, southern Ireland, is going to be

John Keats was born October 31, 1795 in Central London. His parents were middle class but didn’t have the funds to send him to a higher public school. So Keats went to John Clarke’s school located Enfield.

This poem is also about Art, and the Irish people's response to it. It is structured around the contrast between the Yeats' dream to write for the Irish people, and the reality.

Yeats wrote this poem in respect of Major Robert Gregory, who died in the War. An Irish Airman Foresees His Death is written in the background of the Easter 1916 when the Irish people have demanded the independence from Britain. This poem was written for Gregory’s devoted duty for his countrymen by joining in the British Royal Flying Company (Walsh, 2012). In Easter 1916, Yeats proposed that Ireland had to confirm its independence and states identity through rebellion and the affectionate discovery of change. So, the unwanted bloodshed and sacrifice perpetually change the state of the

As and introduction to Heaney poems, I will use a poem of Yeats, who is the poet that starts to talk about postcolonial themes. Maybe Yeats was one the most important figures in the reconstruction of the Irish identity. He represents the relationship between Ireland and Britain in his poem "Leda and the Swan". The first publication of this poem was in the radical magazine "To-morrow" in 1923. Some years later it was republished in the

Mr. Yeats relates his vision, either real or imagined, concerning prophesies of the days of the Second coming. The writer uses the Holy Bible scripture text for his guide for because no one could explain this period of time without referring to the Holy Bible. He has chosen to present it in the form of a poem, somewhat like the quatrains of Nostradamus. The poem does not cover all the details of this event, but does give the beginning of the powerful messages, and a dark look at those ominous days surrounding the Second Coming of The Lord Jesus Christ. Perhaps he is trying in his own words to warn everyone about the end time days.

As the reader looks deeper into the poem he/she might find alternate meanings behind the luring of the child. Yeats was a nationalist during a time of great political upheaval in Ireland. Nationalists wanted Ireland return to years before when Ireland was considered one nation. The Celtic images of the past could represent a desire to return to a time where Ireland was united. The freedom that the faery world allows is representative of the freedom that unity throughout Ireland allowed before religion and politics became large issues.

William Butler Yeats was an Irish poet, a dramatist, and a prose writer - one of the greatest English-language poets of the twentieth century. (Yeats 1) His early poetry and drama acquired ideas from Irish fable and arcane study. (Eiermann 1) Yeats used the themes of nationalism, freedom from oppression, social division, and unity when writing about his country. Yeats, an Irish nationalist, used the three poems, “To Ireland in the Coming Times,” “September 1913” and “Easter 1916” which revealed an expression of his feelings about the War of Irish Independence through theme, mood and figurative language.