Historical Figure
William Butler Yeats
b. 1865
Irish poet and playwright (1865–1939)
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Biography
William Butler Yeats was an Irish poet, dramatist, writer and literary critic who was one of the foremost figures of 20th-century literature. He was a driving force behind the Irish Literary Revival and, along with John Millington Synge and Lady Gregory, founded the Abbey Theatre, serving as its chief during its early years. He was awarded the 1923 Nobel Prize in Literature and later served two terms as a Senator of the Irish Free State.
In Their Own Words (5)
Wine comes in at the mouthAnd love comes in at the eye;That's all we shall know for truthBefore we grow old and die.I lift the glass to my mouth,I look at you, and I sigh.
A Drinking Song , 1910
Words are always getting conventionalized to some secondary meaning. It is one of the works of poetry to take the truants in custody and bring them back to their right senses. Poets are the policemen of language; they are always arresting those old reprobates the words.
Letter to Ellen O'Leary (3 February 1889) , 1889
When I play on my fiddle in Dooney,Folk dance like a wave of the sea.
The Fiddler Of Dooney, st. 1 , 1899
The Land of Faery,Where nobody gets old and godly and grave,Where nobody gets old and crafty and wise,Where nobody gets old and bitter of tongue.
Lines 48–52 , 1894
Though leaves are many, the root is one;Through all the lying days of my youthI swayed my leaves and flowers in the sun;Now I may wither into the truth.
The Coming Of Wisdom With Time , 1910
Timeline
The story of William Butler Yeats, told in moments.
Co-founded the Irish Literary Theatre with Lady Gregory and George Moore. It became the Abbey Theatre in 1904. Yeats ran it for years. The project helped ignite the Irish Literary Revival.
Married Georgie Hyde-Lees after Maud Gonne rejected him for the final time. She'd refused him at least four times over 27 years. Georgie was 25. He was 52. She practiced automatic writing, which fed directly into his mystical poetry.
Awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature. The committee praised his "inspired poetry, which in a highly artistic form gives expression to the spirit of a whole nation." He was also serving as a senator of the new Irish Free State.
Died in Menton, France, at 73. Buried temporarily in Roquebrune. His body was reinterred at Drumcliff churchyard in Sligo in 1948. His gravestone reads what he wrote: "Cast a cold eye / On life, on death. / Horseman, pass by."
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