Poems
1895
- poetry
- manuscripts
- translations into irish
- english love poetry
- english manuscripts
- translations into french
- love poetry
- criticism and interpretation
- irish authors
- english poetry
The story
A collection of the poetry of W. B. Yeats, famed Irish poet whose early poems are strongly influenced by the Pre-Raphaelites, and his later poems having more modernist leanings, although retaining the traditional forms rather than adopting free verse.
What it’s like
Soft, dreamy and ornate on the page: this early Yeats collection is steeped in the Celtic twilight, with mist-grey meadows, hazel woods, rose-coloured candlelight, peat smoke and pale, shining figures drifting through legend. The voice is incantatory and musical, long lines that pull the reader slowly, often read aloud, with the rhythm of folk ballad and the lush imagery of the Pre-Raphaelites. Its mood is wistful, yearning, faintly melancholy, and tender in its love poems, with the sense of longing that never quite reaches its object. Sound is central: the verse is built to be heard, and its cadences hum like a low harp or a quiet fiddle in a dim room. Pacing is unhurried, with each poem a small, self-contained spell, and the emotional arc moves from dreamy idealism toward a more sober, questioning maturity in the later pieces. There is no violence, gore or sexual content, only quiet sorrow and occasional gentle sadness. Ideal for late-night reading, a rainy afternoon, or anyone who loves lyric verse, Irish myth and English love poetry in its most romantic, wistful form.
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