In form and content, W. B Yeats is a true example of an Modern Poet. Have a look how I have proceeded. W B Yeats biography by Nobel Prize org. More info about Yeats. Dear readers, feel free to write to me if you need help. Contact over email. Or give me a text over phone. Labels: Modern Poetry , Poetry , W. B Yeats. The horrible effects of war cast a gloomy shadow on the poetic sensibility of the modern poets.
He feels even for his rival. He is the chief representative of the Symbolist Movement. He draws his symbols from Irish folklore and mythology, philosophy, metaphysics, occult, magic, paintings and drawings. Several allusions are compressed into a single symbol. His symbols are all pervasive key symbols. Yet one can not simply place Yeats into just one mould, one rigid and defined style of poetry because as a writer during both periods of Romanticism and Modernism, Yeats straddles the line between the two periods and incorporates 'romantic ideologies' into his modern work.
His poems seen as the examples of modern liyerature. In his poems, we found astounding variety, political note, realism, religion, mysticism and so on. And all these matters have made him a true modern poet. By nature he was a dreamer, a thinker,who fell under the spell of the folklore and the superstitions of the Irish peasantry. He is a prominent poet in modern times for his sense of moral wholeness of humanity and history. Yeats may be credited primary with the owner of contributing the elements of mysticism to modern poetry.
He juxtaposes historical figures with Irish legends and myths and hence create something new and different, it is to be considered that Yeats is one of the writers that utilized the elements of the supernatural stemming from Irish mythology, and one of the fewer who also integrated romantic notions into his poetry. Yeats is the only modern poet who initiated occult system and mysticism in his poetry.
Mysticism runs throughout his poetry in which the Gods and fairies of the Celtic mythology live again. To Yeats, a poet is very close to a mystic and poet's mystical experience give to the poem a spiritual world. It is not at all surprising that obscurity in Yeats poetry is due to his occultism, mysticism, Irish mythology, use of symbolism and theory of 'Mask'.
Yeats was keen to replace traditional Greek and Roman and mythological figures with figures from Irish folklore which results in obscurity. The juxtaposition of the past and the present, The spiritual and the physical, and many such dissimilar concepts and his condensed rich language make his poetry of obscure.
After the World War -I people got totally shattered and they suffered from frustration boredom, anxiety and loneliness. Yeats has used different type of landscape to symbolise the spiritual and psychological states of modern man. This poem has been seen as an example of modern zeitgiest literature at once depicting the decentring and internal fissure of 20th century culture and analysing the parting of a classical psychological period.
Yeats portrays that the war has been ended, its effects are continuously affecting the people of modern age. He says that there remains insecurity and disorder everywhere. Yeats feels gloomy and fears of a stormy future. Similarly, the mackerels, salmons, fish and fowl symbolize morality and transience of life. The metaphors used for an aging body numerous, such as, 'a tattered coat upon a stick', 'tatter in its mortal dress', 'fastened to a dying animal'. There is a political and personal reference of Ireland, the poet wishes to go back to a time when Ireland was a peaceful and economical country.
The phrase 'dying generations' possibly refers to the Irish Rebellion, when people suffered deaths and losses and had to part with their loved ones. Byzantium was the centre of a successful civilization in the 6th century, it is a reference to the ancient city previously named Constantinople built by the Roman Emperor Constantine, it was the headquarters of Eastern Christianity.
The city was believed to be a place where God existed. It was a place culturally rich and artistically Utopian in nature. Byzantium is far away, remote, exotic and has an added connotation of a spiritual and artistic centre, it is also a metaphor for creativity or a platonic heaven of ideal forms of art. The main theme of the poem is 'aging', a theme quite personal and common for Yeats' later poems.
He renounces his almost-dead state and imaginatively "sailed the seas and come to the holy city of Byzantium. The modern feature of realism is apparent here when Yeats likens an old man's body to a 'dying animal'. Through his constant desire of escaping to the perfect land of Byzantium, Yeats is indirectly pointing at the imperfect land that he wishes to leave.
One of the most common and important themes of Modern poetry, the degeneration and chaos of modern life is evident in this poem. Line 6 of the poem, 'Whatever is begotten, born and dies' conveying the feelings of loss familiar to the modern poetry. Waste, death, decadence of mortal beings is prevalent throughout the poem especially in association with old age.
The authors personal experiences form the centre of this poem. Yeats is noticeably preoccupied with the flesh and the decay, desolation and dullness that accompanies old age. The poem consists of several modern features such as unconventional metaphors, references such as Michelangelo and William Blake, and simple diction. There is a juxtaposition of ideas, such as 'old man's frenzy', and 'old man's eagle mind'.
The tone of the poem is confessional.
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