Constant, Changeless Change (An Argumentative Text About Yeats’s Representations of Change And Changeless)

William Butler Yeats was a poet during the transition from the nineteenth to the twentieth century. He was a brilliant poet. He had a way of making complex images, representing his philosophies regarding change and changeless, with words. He had a lot of unique ideas on philosophical topics such as these. “Yeats developed a philosophy that united his interest in history, art, personality, and society.” (1144). In the five poems written by Yeats, and compiled in our textbook, the opposition between radical change and changeless is illustrated very clearly.

In the poem, When You are Old, Yeats tells the intended reader, a woman, that his love for her won’t change, but hopefully, her feelings for him will change when she reads the poem. This poem is a love poem. It is slightly bitter, but a love poem, nonetheless. Yeats says that he loves the ambition and the thirst for adventure in her. “But one man loved the pilgrim soul in you.” (7). On this, I couldn’t agree more with Yeats. Yeats says that he loves her, but she doesn’t love him yet. He hopes that when something chang...