WILLIAM BUTLER YEATS 1865-1939 1: Biographical Hints Poet and a Dramatist: Met GB Shaw, Oscar Wilde and others.

hers. 1889: Published first volume of poety Wanderings of Oisin. Chief Playwright of his time: Abbey Theatre (National Theatre). Elected to Irish Senate in 1922: Won Noble Prize for Literature in 1923. Met Maud Gonne at the age of 24: Fell in Love: She never reciprocated.

2: Age of W.B .Yeats (Contemporary Affairs) Every writer comes directly or indirectly under the influence of his own age. Subjectivity and Objectivity. On the arrival of English and Scottish Protestants in early seventeenth century, Political and military defeat of Gaelic Ireland, Sectarian conflict became recurrent theme in Irish history The New Constitution by Saadat Hassan Manto: Post Colonial Experiences comparison and contrast(Indo-Pak subcontinent and Ireland). 1914: Third Home Rule Act to establish Self Govt. for Ireland was passed. P. B Shelley and T.S Eliot: Revolutionist/Nationalism compare and contrasted (The Waste Land versus The Second Coming, Gyres & Sailing to Byzantium. 3: Mysticism Pursuit of communion with or awareness of an ultimate reality, divinity, spiritual truth or God through direct experience, intuition, instinct or insight. In Hellenistic World mystical referred to secret religious rituals. In Islam it is called Suffism, they emphasize the purification of heart from vices such as greed, lust, envy etc.(Al-Ghazali: Abdul Qadir Jillani). Christianity: Catholic Spirituality: Spiritual enlightenment, spiritual vision, the love of God, union with God. Islam: Sunni, Shia, Suffism: Innate belief in God (Fanna). The system developed in A Vision(A Prose Work by Yeats) is a curious mixture of the elements of magic, mysticism, mythology and philosophy: Moon-Subjectivity/Sun-Objectivity between these two extremes 26 phases are account for all possible types of human personality. Islamic Suffism (07 worlds inside man) . Doctorine of Mask (A Vision) All human happiness depends upon having the .as something not oneself. Influenced by Hindu Upanishads, St.Thomas Aquinas, William Blake and Nietzsche. Letter to OLeary in 1892 Yeats wrote If I had not made magic my constant study, I could not have written a word of my Black Book, nor could the Countess Cathleen ever have come to exist. The mystical life is the centre of all that I do and all that I think all what I write. 4: Symbolism Two methods of writing poetry: 1:Spontaneous 2:A laborious process Yeats: Called the chief representative of symbolist movement in Literature in Ireland. Passionate Syntax: The Second Coming, The Tower, starkest facts into starkest words.

An aged man is but a paltry thing, A tattered coat upon a stick(Sailing to Byzantium)

An Old Mans Winter Night Robert Frost

One aged man -- one man -- can't keep a house, A farm, a countryside, or if he can, It's thus he does it of a winter night.

Metaphorical aphorism, use of epigram

Out of Ireland have we come, Great hatred, little room, Maimed us at the start

Yeats thinks A symbol is the possible expression of some invisible essence, a transparent lamp about a spiritual flame Sources for Yeats symbols are diverse: 1.Irish Folklore 2.Mythology 3.Magic 4.Alchemy 5.Occultism 6.Philosophy 7.Metaphysics 8.Paintings and Drawings Sword presented to him in 1920 by a Japanese admirer. It because on one hand the symbol of life, war, love, and sex while its covering of a Japanese ladys court dress, came to stand for the female sex. On the other hand the sword also symbolizes the soul or the vital principle unaffected by time, and the tattered covering stood for the old and decayed body which could still guard the soul. All pervasive key-symbols 1.Rose-intellectual beauty, austerity, the beauty of women, Maud Gonne Ireland 2.The Swan 3.Hellen.Destructive Beauty A Dialogue of Self and Soul 1. Winding Stair: Path of escape (Soul inclined to contemplate on the winding stair 2. Satos Sword: Self prefers to contemplate on Satos sword instead re-asserts the right to live life again and to suffer as man (Sword is used as a masculine symbol of life, war, love and sex) Among School Children Dance: Concept of unity-Suggestion that one can neither separate the part from the whole nor body from spirit Sailing to Byzantium 1. Byzantium :Symbol for unity and perfection-It suggests a far-off ,unfamiliar civilization which is symbolical of the ideal, aesthetic existence he longs for. The Second Coming 1. Falconer: Symbol of Christ, soul and spirituality 2. Falcon: Symbol of Mankind, Christianity