The second coming By william Butler Yeats Historical
The second coming By william Butler Yeats
Historical Background Written in 1919 after World War I, making it part of the Modernist period. • Between 1815, the end of the Napoleonic Wars and 1914 (WWI), Europe has enjoyed almost a century without major conflict: this was an exceptionally long period of peace. Then in 1914, the World War, The Irish Easter Rising, the Russian Revolution, the rise of the Communist movement in Germany, and soon after the rise of Fascism in both Germany and Italy- all followed each other rapidly. Suddenly everybody was fighting in Europe. •
Uses Christian imagery to describe the atmosphere of post-war Europe. • Yeats originally referred to Edmund Burke and the Germans on the Russian border, but these details were removed and much of the poem’s power derives from its prophetic generalisation and vagueness. • Yeats’ book, A Vision, describes a universal system of cyclical birth, based on a turning gyre. • Yeats was born in Dublin, Ireland, and was fascinated by mysticism and spiritualism. •
Modernism Alienation from belief structures and social structures Resentment of the Victorian mind-set Fragmentation, Loss, and Cynicism Rejection of genres, literary traditions Imagist narrative instead of dramatic monologue
Modernist Poetry Came as a result of the political changes and two world wars. Any sense of confidence in Victorian literature is replaced by the loss of faith, suffering and uncertainty that modern literature expresses. • Modern poetry arose as a reaction against Victorian conservative ideals, which become questionable in the widespread turmoil and suffering of the early 20 th century. • Modernist poetry is mostly pessimistic as a result of the widespread suffering due to world wars and what they viewed as the collapse of society. •
• Poetry must be ‘impersonal, ’ that is, greater than and outside of the personality of the poet. • “It is not the ‘greatness, ’ the intensity of the emotions, the components but the intensity of the artistic process, the pressure…under which the fusion takes place, that counts. ” – T. S. Eliot, Tradition and the Individual Talent, 1219.
William Butler Yeats (1865 -1939) and poetry “There is now overwhelming evidence that man stands between eternities, that of his family and that of his soul. I apply those beliefs to literature and politics and show the change they must make. . My belief must go into what I write, even if I estrange friends; some when they see my meaning set out in plain print will hate me for poems which they have thought meant nothing. ”
The speaker in the poem The speaker in this poem is someone prophetic, someone who knows more than the rest of the world and is able to see things that others cannot see. The speaker is very pessimistic.
The title One might think that the second coming is that of Jesus, but this interpretation has pure biblical origins. Yeats is talking about a new being that will awaken amidst the chaotic post-war climate of the times.
Turning and turning in the widening gyre • Each circle equals 2000 years of history. • Each new gyre (circle) brings about chaos and destruction of the old. • In 1921, Yeats thought that world is on the brink of the end!
The poem Creates an elaborate mythology to explain the entire history of human experience Uses interest in spiritual and occult to predict the rise of an inhuman world Poem is written after the catastrophe of World War I with communism and fascism on the rise History is moved in two thousand-year cycles. The Christian era, which followed that of the ancient world, was about to end an ominous period was about to begin.
The poem Turning and Turning in the widening gyre The falcon cannot hear the falconer; Things fall apart; the center cannot hold; Mere anarchy is loosed upon the world Spinning in the growing vortex, the falcon is too far from the falconer. The Falcon has gotten itself lost by flying too far away. The falconer, who trained his bird to return, is now unable to summon the bird, which cannot hear the cry to return home. This image of the falcon and falconer can be read as a reference to the collapse of traditional social arrangements in Europe. The world is in chaos, the center breaks apart and the world is in lawless state.
The falcon cannot hear the falconer;
The blood-dimmed tide is loosed, and everywhere The ceremony of innocence is drowned; The best lack all conviction, while the worst Are full of passionate intensity. A wave of blood crashes down. A tide red with blood is released and loosed over everything, suggesting massive violent deaths, as in war. This tide drowns bodies as well as innocence itself- it washes away purity. Everywhere the innocent people are drowned the good are weak because of the lack of conviction, while the bad are passionate and intense. The reference here is to the effect of the fiery language of fanaticism and hatred.
Surely some revelation is at hand; Surely the Second Coming is at hand. The Second Coming! Hardly are those words out. When a vast image of Spiritus Mundi Troubles my sight: a waste of desert sand; Surely it is time for some divine truth; Surely it is time for the Second Coming. It is a call for salvation with a tone of desperation. Mankind has reached a level where only divine intervention can save him. Hardly had I spoken those words when a vision of World Spirit Troubled me.
Somewhere in sands of the desert A shape with lion body and the head of a man, A gaze blank and pitiless as the sun, Is moving its slow thighs, while all about it Reel shadows of the indignant desert birds. In the desert, the shape of sphinx, Eyes blank and cruel like the sun, is standing up, while its motion startles nearby birds into angry flight. The sphinx’ gaze mirrors his incapacity of having empathy with other human beings. This second coming is not about the coming of Jesus. The birds’ circling is similar to the falcon’s gyre, but these birds may be vultures flying in circles because they know something will die soon. The sphinx seems to be a bad omen, a herald of war and destruction.
The darkness drops again; But now i know That twenty centuries of stony sleep Were vexed to nightmare by a rocking cradle, And what rough beast, its hour come round at least, Slouches towards Bethlehm to be born? After the vision ends, “darkness drops again”. But from the vision’s insight, he has learned something: a rocking cradle, a reference to the birth of Jesus, has caused two thousand years of sleep (no progress), leading to the present nightmare. This era has come to an end. A rough beast is awakening and leading slowly towards Bethlehm to be born. The speaker’s question about what kind of beast is about to be born is a sign of confusion and intense expectation of the unknown that might be overwhelmingly horrible.
The form of the poem Blank verse: the poem has a consistent meter but no rhyme scheme. Iambic pentameter: roughly iambic pentameter; most lines have ten syllables.
The tone of the poem is pessimistic. The author sees the worst side of things and has no hope for the future. Shifts from the first stanza to the second stanza seeming to lose confidence.
Symbolism Falcon: man Falconer: God Distance between God and man.
Lines 9 -17 (Irony) The images in these lines ironically reverse the readers’ expectations about “the Second Coming”. Chaos Vexed Jesus Gaze blank stormy Heaven Pitiless nightmare eternity Indignant rough beasts good
Themes Chaos and irrationality: it is at the beginning of a new age of disintegration and chaos. The loss of communication and lack of control are symptoms of the disorder that the poem describes. • Good and evil are difficult to tell apart: “the best lack all conviction, while the worst are full of passionate intensity”. It seems that Yeats reveres the worst people simply because they are passionate in what they believe. •
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