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Essays on Yeats
Essays on Yeats
Irish nationalism in Yeats' poetry
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How can one’s life’s work turn into poetry? One can assume that poetry is only cause from despair. William Butler Yeats’s poetry says otherwise. Yeats uses the strength from his long and dedicated background into poetry. From the time spent as a young boy, seeing different religious views from his family motivated him to excel as a poet entering manhood. Being acknowledged as one of the best English-language poets of the 20th century, William Butler Yeats’s plays, notable poetry, and changes in art made him successful. William Butler Yeats was born June 13, 1865 in Samdymount, Dublin in Ireland. Yeats’s father, John Butler Yeats, was a barrister who in time became a portrait painter. Yeats’s mother, Susan Pollexfen, was the daughter of a wealthy merchant in Sligo. Though his parents were both Protestant, William believed in a tradition more deeply than Protestant and Catholic. He was repulsed by Protestants for their distress for material success and he could not share their faith with the Catholics. He believed his best choice was to develop a tradition more insightful than Protestantism: the tradition of a veiled Ireland that was more pagan than Christianity by its customs and beliefs (“William Butler Yeats”). In 1867, Yeats’s family moved to London where he spent much of his childhood with his grandparents in Sligo. This country inspired many of Yeats’s poems and forms their setting. In 1880, Yeats and his family moved back to their hometown where he attended high school. In 1883, he attended the Metropolitan School of Art in Dublin, where he met other poets and artists. In the meantime, Yeats had begun to write by starting off with his first publication of two brief lyrics that appeared in the Dublin University Review in... ... middle of paper ... ... carefree about love. His beloved comforts him with her snow white hand indicating that she is young and carefree. She leaves him telling him to take life easy. As she leaves, he is full tears beginning to feel that he will never love again. References Bloom. Harold. William Butler Yeats. New York: Chelsea House of Publishers, 1970. Donogue, Denis. William Butler Yeats. New York: The Viking Press, 1971. Frenz, Horst. William Butler Yeats-Biographical. Amsterdam: Elsvier Publishing, 1969. < http://www.nobelprize.org/nobel_prizes/literature/lauredates/1923/yeats- bio.html > Maddox, Brenda. Yeat’s Ghosts. New York: Harper Collins Publishers, 1999. “William Butler Yeats.” Encyclopedia Britannica Online. Encyclopedia Britannica. 8 Apr < http://www. britannica.com/ EB checked/topic/652421/ William-Butler- Yeats>
Keats’ poetry explores many issues and themes, accompanied by language and technique that clearly demonstrates the romantic era. His poems ‘Ode to a Nightingale’ and ‘Bright Star’ examine themes such as mortality and idealism of love. Mortality were common themes that were presented in these poems as Keats’ has used his imagination in order to touch each of the five senses. He also explores the idea that the nightingale’s song allows Keats to travel in a world of beauty. Keats draws from mythology and christianity to further develop these ideas. Keats’ wrote ‘Ode To A Nightingale’ as an immortal bird’s song that enabled him to escape reality and live only to admire the beauty of nature around him. ‘Bright Star’ also discusses the immortal as Keats shows a sense of yearning to be like a star in it’s steadfast abilities. The visual representation reveal these ideas as each image reflects Keats’ obsession with nature and how through this mindset he was able
Ezra Jack Keats: A Virtual Exhibit. The University of Southern Mississippi De Grummond Children's Literature Collection. Web. 19 July 2010. .
Yeats, William Butler. The De-Anglicizing of Ireland” in Yeats’s Poetry, Drama, and Prose. ed. Pethica, James. W.W. Norton & Company, USA, 2000.
Time is endlessly flowing by and its unwanted yet pending arrival of death is noted in the two poems “When I Have Fears,” by John Keats and “Mezzo Cammin,” by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow. Keats speaks with no energy; only an elegiac tone of euphoric sounds wondering if his life ends early with his never attained fame. He mentions never finding a “fair creature” (9) of his own, only experiencing unrequited love and feeling a deep loss of youth’s passion. Though melancholy, “Mezzo Cammin,” takes a more conversational tone as Longfellow faces what is commonly known as a midlife crisis. The two poems progressions contrast as Keats blames his sorrow for his lack of expression while Longfellow looks at life’s failures as passions never pursued. In spite of this contrast, both finish with similar references to death. The comparable rhyme and rhythm of both poems shows how both men safely followed a practiced path, never straying for any spontaneous chances. The ending tones evoking death ultimately reveal their indications towards it quickly advancing before accomplish...
Everett, Glenn. "John Keats---A Brief Biography." The Victorian Web. N.p., July 2000. Web. 21 Dec. 2013. .
William Butler Yeats, born in Dublin, Ireland [June 13, 1865], is considered by many to be one of the greatest English-language poets of the 20th century. The following exposition, grounded on the hypothesis that Yeats’ poetry was resolutely influenced by the political occurrences of that time period, will give biographical information, a recounting of the political upheaval during that period, specific poetry excerpts/critical analysis and validation of hypothesis.
William Yeats is deliberated to be among the best bards in the 20th era. He was an Anglo-Irish protestant, the group that had control over the every life aspect of Ireland for almost the whole of the seventeenth era. Associates of this group deliberated themselves to be the English menfolk but sired in Ireland. However, Yeats was a loyal affirmer of his Irish ethnicity, and in all his deeds, he had to respect it. Even after living in America for almost fourteen years, he still had a home back in Ireland, and most of his poems maintained an Irish culture, legends and heroes. Therefore, Yeats gained a significant praise for writing some of the most exemplary poetry in modern history
Imagery and symbolism merged to express his imagination, he became a unique poet in an evolving world where Romanticism was quickly expanding globally, not into a movement, but a way of thinking. Keats’ mother and brother, and eventually he too, passed away of tuberculosis. At the time of his brother 's passing, he developed ‘La Belle Dame sans Merci’. ‘La Belle’ expressed Keats’ intellect and creativity, although at the same time he himself expressed his angst and depression for the loss of his brother. His poem ‘Bright Star’ was written in a part of his life in which a woman had influenced Keats’ greatly, so much in fact that he was driven to write ‘Bright Star’ in appreciation and celebration of the love of his life. These poems reflect Keats’ intellect, originality, creativity, and his ability to merge the contextual aspects of his life and his imagination with the ideals and concepts of Romanticism to create powerful
The poem September 1913 focuses on the time where the Irish Independence was at its highest. Yeats repeats the phrase “romantic Ireland” a lot in this poem as it refers to the sacrifice of the materialistic things for independence and freedom. To further emphasize the importance and greatness of the revolution, Yeats pointed out the names of heroic individuals who gave their lives to fight for the cause. Yeats did not give any detail about the Irish heroes but he does state that “they have gone about the world like wind” (11). The heroes were so famous; their names could be heard and talked about all over the world. In this poem, Yeats does not go directly in to detail about the historical events that happened but fo...
This refrain enforces his disgust at the type of money hungry people that the Irish have become. In the third and fourth stanza, however, Yeats completely changes the tone of his poetry. He praises the romantics of Irish history, such as Rob...
...otism is established in a seemingly simple testament to a dead soldier. What better way to honor the dead than to personify Lady Ireland through his character! The passion that Yeats subconsciously incorporates into his poem equals that of his love for Ireland. An Irish Airman Foresees His Death begins on a low and desperate note, but reaches its’ climax upon Gregory answering Ireland’s call, and ends by, essentially, posing a question to the reader. ‘As a collective people, which side of the teeter-totter do we belong?’ He leaves his hero (Gregory) hanging in the balance of an important national question. The poem may be about Yeats’ character foreseeing his death, but the fact remains: he is in the act of ‘foreseeing,’ he is not dead yet…and neither is Ireland.
In many poems, short stories, plays, television shows and novels an author usually deals with a main idea in each of their works. A main reason they do this is due to the fact that they either have a strong belief in that very idea or it somehow correlates to an important piece of their life overall. For example the author Thomas Hardy likes to deal with the idea of loss in many different ways within his poems some being positive and some being negative. William Butler Yeats has a main philosophical idea which he sticks to and portrays in his poems he believes once you die you come back as another life form this would be rather than a linear view on life a spherical view on life. Just as Thomas Hardy deals with loss in his poems William Butler Yeats likes to play with the idea of change and changelessness. A critic by the name of Richard Ellmann explains that Yeats' poetry deals with opposition of both “the world of change”, and a world of “changelessness”. The idea of change or changelessness is in fact included in each of Yeat’s poems; When You Are Old, The Lake Isle of Innisfree, The Wild Swans at Coole, The Second Coming and Sailing to Byzantium.
Yeats and Eliot are two chief modernist poet of the English Language. Both were Nobel Laureates. Both were critics of Literature and Culture expressing similar disquietude with Western civilization. Both, prompted by the Russian revolution perhaps, or the violence and horror of the First World War, pictured a Europe that was ailing, that was literally falling apart, devoid of the ontological sense of rational purpose that fuelled post-Enlightenment Europe and America(1). All these similar experience makes their poetry more valuable to compare and to contrast since their thoughts were similar yet one called himself Classicist(Eliot) who wrote objectively and the other considered himself "the last Romantic" because of his subjective writing and his interest in mysticism and the spiritual. For better understanding of these two poets it is necessary to mention some facts and backgrounds on them which influenced them to incorporate similar (to some extent) historical motif in their poetry.
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.
W. B. Yeats is one of the foremost poets in English literature even today. He was considered to be one of the most important symbolists of the 20th century. He was totally influenced by the French movement of the 19th century. He was a dreamer and visionary, who was fascinated by folk-lore, ballad and superstitions of the Irish peasantry. Yeats poems are fully conversant with the Irish background, the Irish mythologies etc. Yeats has tried to bring back the “simplicity” and “altogetherness” of the earlier ages and blend it with the modern ideas of good and evil. Almost all his poems deal with ancient Ireland ...