The Wild Swans At Coole & Other Poems: “What can be explained is not poetry.”

By W B Yeats

William Butler Yeats (1865 – 1939) is best described as Ireland’s national poet in addition to being one of the major twentieth-century literary figures of the English tongue. To many literary critics, Yeats represents the ‘Romantic poet of modernism,’ which is quite revealing about his extraordinary style that combines between the outward emphasis on the expression of emotions and the extensive use of symbolism, imagery and allusions. Yeats also wrote prose and drama and established himself as the spokesman of the Irish cause. His fame was greatly boosted mainly after he received the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1923. His life was marked by his many love stories, by his great interest in oriental mysticism and occultism as well as by political engagement since he served as an Irish senator for two terms. Today, although William Butler Yeats’s contribution to literary modernism and to Irish nationalism remains incontestable. Here we publish a collection of his poems that show just why his works are held in such esteem including The Wild Swans At Coole that many regard as his finest achievement.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Copyright Group
• Release date: Nov 29, 2013
• ISBN: 9781783946952

W B Yeats

William Butler Yeats was born in 1865 in County Dublin. With his much-loved early poems such as 'The Stolen Child', and 'He Remembers Forgotten Beauty', he defined the Celtic Twilight mood of the late-Victorian period and led the Irish Literary Renaissance. Yet his style evolved constantly, and he is acknowledged as a major figure in literary modernism and twentieth-century European letters. T. S. Eliot described him as 'one of those few whose history is the history of their own time, who are part of the consciousness of an age which cannot be understood without them'. W. B. Yeats died in 1939.

Book preview

The Wild Swans at Coole & Other Poems by W.B. Yeats

William Butler Yeats (1865 – 1939) was born in Dublin, educated both there and in London.

He is best described as Ireland’s national poet in addition to being one of the major twentieth-century literary figures of the English tongue. To many literary critics, Yeats represents the ‘Romantic poet of modernism’ – an extraordinary style that combines the outward emphasis on the expression of emotions and the extensive use of symbolism, imagery and allusions.

Yeats also wrote extensively for prose and drama and established himself as the spokesman of the Irish cause.

His fame was greatly boosted after he received the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1923.

Yeat’s life was marked by his many love stories, by his great interest in oriental mysticism and occultism as well as by political engagement; he served as an Irish senator for two terms.

Today William Butler Yeats’s contribution to literary modernism and to Irish nationalism remains incontestable. 

Here we publish a collection of his poems that show just why his works are held in such esteem including The Wild Swans At Coole that many regard as his finest achievement.  

Index Of Contents

PREFACE

THE WILD SWANS AT COOLE                          

IN MEMORY OF MAJOR ROBERT GREGORY                

AN IRISH AIRMAN FORESEES HIS DEATH              

MEN IMPROVE WITH THE YEARS                      

THE COLLAR-BONE OF A HARE                       

UNDER THE ROUND TOWER                           

SOLOMON TO SHEBA                               

THE LIVING BEAUTY                              

A SONG                                          

TO A YOUNG BEAUTY                               

TO A YOUNG GIRL                                 

THE SCHOLARS                                    

TOM O'ROUGHLEY                                  

THE SAD SHEPHERD                                

LINES WRITTEN IN DEJECTION                      

THE DAWN                                        

ON WOMAN                                        

THE FISHERMAN                                   

THE HAWK                                        

MEMORY                                          

HER PRAISE                                      

THE PEOPLE                                      

HIS PHOENIX                                     

A THOUGHT FROM PROPERTIUS                       

BROKEN DREAMS                                   

A DEEP-SWORN VOW                                

PRESENCES                                       

THE BALLOON OF THE MIND                         

TO A SQUIRREL AT KYLE-NA-GNO                    

ON BEING ASKED FOR A WAR POEM    

IN MEMORY OF ALFRED POLLEXFEN    

UPON A DYING LADY                               

EGO DOMINUS TUUS                                

A PRAYER ON GOING INTO MY HOUSE          

THE PHASES OF THE MOON                     

THE CAT AND THE MOON                         

THE SAINT AND THE HUNCHBACK                  

TWO SONGS OF A FOOL                            

ANOTHER SONG OF A FOOL                         

THE DOUBLE VISION OF MICHAEL ROBARTES         

NOTE                                     

W.B. Yeats – A Short Biography

PREFACE

This book is, in part, a reprint of  The Wild Swans at Coole, printed a year ago on my sister's hand-press at Dundrum, Co. Dublin. I have not, however, reprinted a play which may be a part of a book of new plays suggested by the dance plays of Japan, and I have added a number of new poems. Michael Robartes and John Aherne, whose names occur in one or other of these, are characters in some stories I wrote years ago, who have once again become a part of the phantasmagoria through which I can alone express my convictions about the world. I have the fancy that I read the name John Aherne among those of men prosecuted for making a disturbance at the first production of The Play Boy, which may account for his animosity to myself.

W. B. Y.

BALLYLEE, CO. GALWAY,

September 1918.

THE WILD SWANS AT COOLE

The trees are in their autumn beauty,

The woodland paths are dry,

Under the October twilight the water

Mirrors a still sky;

Upon the brimming water among the stones

Are nine and fifty swans.

The nineteenth Autumn has come upon me

Since I first made my count;