“The poetry of The Tower period is rich because of the fullness of Yeats's life, because his style was reaching maturity at the same time as his life.”(p.193) This is how A. Norman Jeffares describes the poetry of The Tower in his book W.B. Yeats, Man and Poet. William Butler Yeats, an Anglo-Irish poet wrote the poems from The Tower between 1912 and 1927 and the collection was published in 1928. Most of these poems have a common theme: violence. Indeed, they were written during a difficult and violent period of the History of Ireland. In less than ten years happened: the Easter Rising in 1916 then the War of independence and the Civil War. However, after all these events, the Free State was born. W.B. Yeats was very influenced by the historical
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As a result, here Yeats chose to talk a lot of the material destruction but also of the human cost of the war. The human cost is more deeply treated in others poems such as in the section IV “My descendants” of the poem “Meditations in Time of Civil War.” In this part, the poet is afraid to loosing his children because of the War which is tearing apart brother. He has a feeling of helplessness very clear which appears through the different questions what the narrator asks himself: “And what if my descendants lose the flower?” Yeats is also consciouss of the fact that he is getting old and that he won't be always there in order to protect his children. The questions linked to old age are a recurrent theme in the …show more content…
The poem tells the story of the rape of Leda by the god Zeus in the form of a swan. The poem is a broken sonnet, it is a very distabilising form as itself but also for the reader, it is quite unusual. Nevertheless, the first two stanzas have a regular rhyme pattern with alternate rhymes (still / caressed / bill / breast). The poem is about one particular event (Leda's rape) which will change the course of History. Indeed, Leda will give birth to several children including Helen, one the cause of the Trojan War. One single event such as Easter 1916 can change the world even if the Easter Rising was a failure in itself, it started to lead the way for independence. The two events: the rape and Easter 1916 are both points of no-return. The poem is full of binary concepts, indeed right from the beginning, he associates the brutaly of the event with the past participle “caressed” with is usually associated with acts of tenderness and not acts of violence. He also associated the powerful divine “the feathered glory” against the helpless Leda “How those terrified vague fingers push...”. Here Leda and the Swan are used as a symbol for Ireland and its political situation. The actions have consequences and here with this poem Yeats wants to show that the New State cannot go against the changes that are about to happen.
As a result, here Yeats chose to talk a lot of the material destruction but also of the human cost of the war. The human cost is more deeply treated in others poems such as in the section IV “My descendants” of the poem “Meditations in Time of Civil War.” In this part, the poet is afraid to loosing his children because of the War which is tearing apart brother. He has a feeling of helplessness very clear which appears through the different questions what the narrator asks himself: “And what if my descendants lose the flower?” Yeats is also consciouss of the fact that he is getting old and that he won't be always there in order to protect his children. The questions linked to old age are a recurrent theme in the …show more content…
The poem tells the story of the rape of Leda by the god Zeus in the form of a swan. The poem is a broken sonnet, it is a very distabilising form as itself but also for the reader, it is quite unusual. Nevertheless, the first two stanzas have a regular rhyme pattern with alternate rhymes (still / caressed / bill / breast). The poem is about one particular event (Leda's rape) which will change the course of History. Indeed, Leda will give birth to several children including Helen, one the cause of the Trojan War. One single event such as Easter 1916 can change the world even if the Easter Rising was a failure in itself, it started to lead the way for independence. The two events: the rape and Easter 1916 are both points of no-return. The poem is full of binary concepts, indeed right from the beginning, he associates the brutaly of the event with the past participle “caressed” with is usually associated with acts of tenderness and not acts of violence. He also associated the powerful divine “the feathered glory” against the helpless Leda “How those terrified vague fingers push...”. Here Leda and the Swan are used as a symbol for Ireland and its political situation. The actions have consequences and here with this poem Yeats wants to show that the New State cannot go against the changes that are about to happen.