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. Maud Gonne, an Irish nationalist and patriot, was a huge muse to Yeats and his poetry. Her passion for Ireland and its freedom was a large part of the reason why William Yeats was so passionate about the dealings in Ireland himself. Maud was born in England but loved Ireland and believed strongly in its independence from Britain. Although she is most known for her association with William Butler Yeats, she had many accomplishments herself. She created the Daughters of Ireland. The Daughters of Ireland was an organization which provided a home for Irish nationalist women and encouraged the study of: Gaelic, Irish literature, history, music and art. Maud also went on a crusade to improve prison conditions after she suffered a brief imprisonment herself. She even wrote a bestselling book herself called A Servant of the
In “Who’s Irish”, Gish Jen demonstrates a family that has Chinese root and American culture at the same time. The main character is a fierce grandmother who lives in with her daughter’s family, and then ironically forced to move out because of her improper behavior during she raises her granddaughter. The author uses some unpleasant language and contents to describe the situation, which are effectively demonstrate how difficult and how struggle for people who lives in the gap between two different cultures. I can’t say who is right or who is wrong, but feel sorry for the grandmother.
When Yeats moved back to London to pursue his interest in Arts, he met famous writers like Maud Gonne. The Poem “To Ireland in the Coming Times” is one of the poems Yeats wrote in 1892 and was published in The Countess Kathleen and Various Legends. “Know, that I would accounted
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’
Young Yeats spent much of his childhood in Sligo, Ireland. It was in Sligo where his earliest visions began to form. Through the Pollexfen’s, William was able to experience life on the water, as his grandfather owned a fleet of ships and the Sligo Steam Navigation Company. As the grandson of this sea merchant, the sailors onboard the fleets, as well as the servants back at home, would all treat young William like royalty. The Pollexfen’s world was complete with yachts and summer homes. Despite separation from his father for much of his youth, William was without want. He was free to wander about to discover the beauties, and explore the myths and legends of this enchanted place. William would miss Sligo immensely when this family would move
The opposing viewpoints between the Irish people before “The Troubles” are expressed the best in the poems, “September 1913” by William Butler Yeats, and “Ulster 1912” by Rudyard Kipling. Yeats’ view can be compared to Nationalists who wanted independence from Great Britain. He even went as far as to use his poem as a political statement to call his fellow Irish peers into action. “Romantic Ireland’s dead and gone/It’s with O’Leary in the grave” (“Yeats” 7-8). O’Leary was a great leader in an uprising for
W.B. Yeats's career started with a heavy influence of Ireland’s very own mythology and folklore. Although, not only Ireland’s mythological culture influenced Yeats's work, personal influences stuck as well. "A potent influence on his poetry was the Irish revolutionary Maud Gonne, whom he met in 1889, a woman equally famous for her passionate nationalist politics and her beauty." (Poets: W.B. Yeats) Lasting as a strong personage in Yeats' verse, Maud Gonne’s appearance was not forgotten. Receiving a proper introduction to some of the poetic greats, Yeats's father showed him the works of Dante Alighieri, William Shakespeare, John Donne, William Blake, and Percy Byshe Shelley to find his own emerging creativity. "notwithstanding, poets of the
This minority had controlled political, social, and cultural life in Ireland since the end of the 17th century, and many who belonged to this group preferred to think of themselves as Irish-born English folk; however, W.B. Yeats was incredibly proud of his Irish heritage, with a strong self-image of an artist. He preferred to be prideful about the rich culture, he was a part of, preferring the beautiful scenery of home to anywhere else in the world. These personal convictions caused many accuse him of elitism, but also contributed to his perceived greatness as a writer. In 1885 his nationalist attitude only grew stronger, this largely due in part to his new-found friend John O’Leary. O’Leary was a recently returned prisoner, and famous patriot, who had been incarcerated and exiled 20 years for his revolutionary nationalist activities. The former revolutionist had a great love for Irish arts and literature, which inspired Yeats to begin producing many poems based on Irish legends, folklore, ballads, and songs. While his friendship with John O’Leary was brief, it only nourished his nationalism and made way for many literary works to come in his
The last two lines of the stanza imply that Yeats is feeling upset about the current state of Ireland by saying, “Romantic Ireland’s dead and gone,”. Yeats concludes the stanza and repeats this line an additional three times by saying “It’s with O’Leary in the grave”, suggests that the prosperous, romantic Ireland Yeats previously described is dead along with John O’Leary, an Irish nationalist. Yeats felt sympathy in particular for John O’Leary because O’Leary inspired Yeats to contribute to the nationalism movement by contributing literature (Norton
W.B.Yeats is distinguished for his resistance to the English influence on Ireland at his time ,he has been classified as a poet of resistance.
J. M. Synge is one of the most prominent Irish writers of the twentieth century; his writing characterizes a broad, multifaceted range of political, social and religious anxieties shaping Ireland for the duration of its most remarkable period of change, which transformed the place from a relatively peaceful country to a more political and aggressive location. The picture Synge creates shows us that the question of identity relating to Ireland is problematic; however it has produced and provoked some of the greatest literature of the century. As G. J. Watson has asserted:
William Butler Yeats was born on June 13, 1865, in Dublin, Irelandtheson of a well-known Irish painter, John Butler Yeatsand died in January 28, 1939, Menton,France. Yeats was deeply complex in politics in Ireland, and in the twenties, notwithstanding Irish independence from England. William Butler Yeats was an Irish poet and one of the important figures of 20th century’s literature considering one of the greatestpoets of a century. W.B Yeats’ poems The Easter1916written in 1916 andan Irish Airman foresees His Deathwritten in 1918and published in 1919, exposes two different groups of people who went to wars during First World War in reflective narrative form. Those
The other difference that sets Yeats and Comain’s poems apart is the reason that attributes to the killing of Irish rebels by British as a result of former’s protest .In Yeats’ Easter, 1916, British had either killed or executed Irish rebels because the latter had planned to revolt against the former and were also armed. This becomes indicative when Yeats in his poem Easter, 1916 argues, “Was it needless death after all? For England may keep faith for all that is done and said” (1916).
Cathleen ni Houlihan, showcased the desire for Ireland to break free from the English. An old woman, who has lost her land
William Butler Yeats was a poet of the twentieth century, a time of change with world wars, revolutions, technology change, and much more. William Yeats is considered the most important poet of the twentieth century. “The Irish poet and dramatist William Butler Yeats (1865-1939) was perhaps the greatest poet of the 20th century. He won the Nobel Prize for literature in 1923 and was the leader of the Irish Literary Renaissance”(Gale). Yeats started his career with plays, and eventually moved to poetry. Poetry gave him a loud voice to express what he wanted. One of his most remembered pieces of work is Sailing to Byzantium. In Yeats's Sailing to Byzantium three messages are displayed.
W.B. Yeat’s poem, Easter 1916, details the speaker’s feelings of Nationalism and heartache as he remembers those that he lost in the Easter Rising. As the speaker reflects on the time before the rising, he remembers not only how his life has changed but also how his friends and companions had transformed both in their character and in their state of being. The speaker uses metaphors to visualize the unchanging goal of Irish freedom and the coming of nights that bring about death and heartache. In this analysis, I will be focusing on the first and last stanzas of the poem. By comparing these two stanzas I will reflect on the literary devices used, as well as the differences of the speaker’s visuals from the beginning and end. Overall, the speaker