William Butler Yeats (1865-1939)

1. William Butler Yeats(1865-1939)

2. Introduction • Yeats and Eliot had great influence upon modern English literature. Their principles and wiring practice were a revolt against the imprecise language and sentimental emotions of the Victorian poets.

3. Introduction • This revolt led to the modernist movement in literature. • He is acknowledged as one of the greatest poets in the English language. • There is profound beauty in his poetry.

4. Introduction • Yeats’s work covered 50 years. He was deep-rooted in Irish culture with its folklore, legends, music and magic, from which he drew wisdom and inspiration and he wrote about the traditions and history of the Irish nation.

5. Features of his poetry • His early poetry was marked by dreamy romanticism with clarity, imagery and musicality. In his later years he found a metaphysical and French symbolistic approach to poetry and wrote on the great, eternal subject of time and change, love and age, life and art.

6. Features of his poetry • His poetry was characterized by disillusion, bitter satire, strong symbolism and the combination of colloquial and formal language.

7. His conception of history • Yeats believed that all history, and life follows a circular, spiral pattern consisting of long cycles which repeat themselves over and over on different levels, so symbols like winding stairs, spinning tops, gyres and spirals are frequent and important in his poems.

8. The Second Coming • 1.main idea • Order is breakng down and communication became impossible. • 2.symbolism • cycles, the widening gyre etc. • 3.biblical allusions • seconding coming,Jesus Christ, cradle, Bethlehem etc.