The Wild Swans at Coole by W.B Yeats
The Wild Swans at Coole
The Wild Swans at Coole by W.B Yeats is one of musicality as it is a direct expression of personal feelings, identified as the author’s. The lyrical poem includes three main subjects: setting, serving as a correlative to these feelings, Swans as the trigger, and the poet himself. Written in loosened iambic pentameter and consisting of five six-line stanzas rhymed ‘abcbdd’, the poem’s reflective and melancholic mood reflect the time of the poems first appearance. During the year of 1916, Yeats’ spirits were low and embedded in this poem are the emotions he has towards the rejection, failure, and loneliness experienced throughout his life. Surprisingly, the poem deceives expectancy as it denies the reader the Irish themes and mythological references, however can be seen as a tribute to the Irish who struggles for the independence of their country and a tribute to all the Irish emigrants who left their land during the potato famine in the mid-nineteenth century. Published only two years after the Easter rising, this is one of Yeats’ emotional, somber works.
Yeats begins his poem with a heavy description of Coole Park. Coole referring to Lady Gregory’s house, Coole Park, calls to mind her writings of folk tales, reflective of Yeats’ writing as that of folklore. At such an early stage of the poem we see how Yeats has been influenced and the introductory description of the landscape that could conjure a cliché Emerald Isle with untouched lakes, woods and wild life. The setting and mentioning of the ‘nine-and-fifity Swans’ introduce themes of change, age, nature and immorality as well as ideas of transition, mysticism and the supernatural. Ultimately, the opening stanza contains references to nature, which is continuous throughout the poem.
Just as the Lakists or Lamartine would, the persona finds himself meditate on his loneliness, an attitude in this poem alongside side that of admiration, impatience, sadness, happiness, reflection,
The Wild Swans at Coole by W.B Yeats is one of musicality as it is a direct expression of personal feelings, identified as the author’s. The lyrical poem includes three main subjects: setting, serving as a correlative to these feelings, Swans as the trigger, and the poet himself. Written in loosened iambic pentameter and consisting of five six-line stanzas rhymed ‘abcbdd’, the poem’s reflective and melancholic mood reflect the time of the poems first appearance. During the year of 1916, Yeats’ spirits were low and embedded in this poem are the emotions he has towards the rejection, failure, and loneliness experienced throughout his life. Surprisingly, the poem deceives expectancy as it denies the reader the Irish themes and mythological references, however can be seen as a tribute to the Irish who struggles for the independence of their country and a tribute to all the Irish emigrants who left their land during the potato famine in the mid-nineteenth century. Published only two years after the Easter rising, this is one of Yeats’ emotional, somber works.
Yeats begins his poem with a heavy description of Coole Park. Coole referring to Lady Gregory’s house, Coole Park, calls to mind her writings of folk tales, reflective of Yeats’ writing as that of folklore. At such an early stage of the poem we see how Yeats has been influenced and the introductory description of the landscape that could conjure a cliché Emerald Isle with untouched lakes, woods and wild life. The setting and mentioning of the ‘nine-and-fifity Swans’ introduce themes of change, age, nature and immorality as well as ideas of transition, mysticism and the supernatural. Ultimately, the opening stanza contains references to nature, which is continuous throughout the poem.
Just as the Lakists or Lamartine would, the persona finds himself meditate on his loneliness, an attitude in this poem alongside side that of admiration, impatience, sadness, happiness, reflection,