Sorry for the verbosity lately but I’m on a roll these days in many directions - thinking must never stop even though you know this stuff.
Island Escape, Rejection, Marriage - Yeats Reborn
Yeats Exhibition: The Life and Works of William Butler Yeats, Dublin, Irish National Museum, highlights manuscripts of Yeats’ most beloved poems including (audio) “The Lake Isle of Innisfree”(1888). When walking through the exhibit I was struck by the intensity of the poets lifelong desire to find himself in a city or on an island from childhood or some Celtic Twilight?
In 1899 he was rejected by Maud Gonne for what was the first of four marriage proposals. Yeats was later rejected in a marriage proposal by Maud’s daughter Iseult. Maude reportedly rejected him for not being Catholic but thought rejection would dispose the poet’s creativity by the feelings of unrequited love - loneliness? ( Dante and Beatrice reborn?).
Three weeks after his rejection by Iseult he married Georgiana in 1917 while still suffering the stings of rejection from Iseult with Ezra Pound in attendance. George ending up being his most inspirational muse in his poetic life and spiritual search ( not on an Island with natures beauty but with his wife and the spiritual euphoria of automatic writing).
Biographical criticism is the lowest form but the historian in me can’t resist. Mr.James Joyce and I have mixed emotions about Yeats yet “the centre cannot hold”.
Sorry for the verbosity lately but I’m on a roll these days in many directions - thinking must never stop even though you know this stuff.
Island Escape, Rejection, Marriage - Yeats Reborn
Yeats Exhibition: The Life and Works of William Butler Yeats, Dublin, Irish National Museum, highlights manuscripts of Yeats’ most beloved poems including (audio) “The Lake Isle of Innisfree”(1888). When walking through the exhibit I was struck by the intensity of the poets lifelong desire to find himself in a city or on an island from childhood or some Celtic Twilight?
In 1899 he was rejected by Maud Gonne for what was the first of four marriage proposals. Yeats was later rejected in a marriage proposal by Maud’s daughter Iseult. Maude reportedly rejected him for not being Catholic but thought rejection would dispose the poet’s creativity by the feelings of unrequited love - loneliness? ( Dante and Beatrice reborn?).
Three weeks after his rejection by Iseult he married Georgiana in 1917 while still suffering the stings of rejection from Iseult with Ezra Pound in attendance. George ending up being his most inspirational muse in his poetic life and spiritual search ( not on an Island with natures beauty but with his wife and the spiritual euphoria of automatic writing).
Biographical criticism is the lowest form but the historian in me can’t resist. Mr.James Joyce and I have mixed emotions about Yeats yet “the centre cannot hold”.