Yeats Essay
W.B Yeats Essay
Write an essay in which you give your reasons for liking/not liking the poetry of W.B Yeats. Support your points by reference to or quotation from, the poems that are on your course.
In my opinion and from the sample of his poetry which I have studied, I would say that the poetry of W.B Yeats is very enjoyable to read. The themes of his poems are often easily identified with and his simple style of writing makes his poetry easy to interpret and understand. Although easily engaging with the themes of his poetry contributes to my liking of Yeats’ poetry, it is his gift of writing that has an impact on me. His use of powerful contrasts and breath-taking imagery easily make Yeats one of the greatest poets of the twentieth century. His poetry is interesting and thought provoking. As Seamus Heaney once said, Yeats “had this marvellous gift for beating the scrap metal of the day-to-day life into a ringing bell”.
One the themes of Yeats’ poetry which interested me quite a lot was the theme of escapism. This theme is apparent in two of the poems which I have studied, “The Lake Isle of Innisfree” and “Sailing to Byzantium”. “The Lake Isle of Innisfree” expresses Yeats’ longing to return home as he was in London at the time when he wrote it. The poet desires to escape from the world of grim reality to a pastoral utopia. In “Sailing to Byzantium”, Yeats’ once more is longing to escape but in contrast to “The Lake Isle of Innisfree”, he longs to escape the process of ageing as opposed to escaping from a physical place. The poet’s desire to return home is made clear in “The Lake Isle of Innisfree” as the poet describes the idyllic life of self-sufficiency “nine bean rows will I have there” and “a hive for the honey bee”. A place of great tranquillity is created in this poem, a place which we all aspire to go to “ And I shall have some peace there, for peace comes dropping slow”. There is a sharp contrast in this poem, between the pastoral utopia of
Write an essay in which you give your reasons for liking/not liking the poetry of W.B Yeats. Support your points by reference to or quotation from, the poems that are on your course.
In my opinion and from the sample of his poetry which I have studied, I would say that the poetry of W.B Yeats is very enjoyable to read. The themes of his poems are often easily identified with and his simple style of writing makes his poetry easy to interpret and understand. Although easily engaging with the themes of his poetry contributes to my liking of Yeats’ poetry, it is his gift of writing that has an impact on me. His use of powerful contrasts and breath-taking imagery easily make Yeats one of the greatest poets of the twentieth century. His poetry is interesting and thought provoking. As Seamus Heaney once said, Yeats “had this marvellous gift for beating the scrap metal of the day-to-day life into a ringing bell”.
One the themes of Yeats’ poetry which interested me quite a lot was the theme of escapism. This theme is apparent in two of the poems which I have studied, “The Lake Isle of Innisfree” and “Sailing to Byzantium”. “The Lake Isle of Innisfree” expresses Yeats’ longing to return home as he was in London at the time when he wrote it. The poet desires to escape from the world of grim reality to a pastoral utopia. In “Sailing to Byzantium”, Yeats’ once more is longing to escape but in contrast to “The Lake Isle of Innisfree”, he longs to escape the process of ageing as opposed to escaping from a physical place. The poet’s desire to return home is made clear in “The Lake Isle of Innisfree” as the poet describes the idyllic life of self-sufficiency “nine bean rows will I have there” and “a hive for the honey bee”. A place of great tranquillity is created in this poem, a place which we all aspire to go to “ And I shall have some peace there, for peace comes dropping slow”. There is a sharp contrast in this poem, between the pastoral utopia of