Yeats gyre theory

Yeats gyre theory

A Wikimédia Commons tartalmaz William Butler Yeats témájú médiaállományokat. Many thinkers, artists, and historians have represented historical development as a straight line; others have put forward a Writing on the heels of the First World War and at the advent of the Irish War of Independence, William Butler Yeats used the concept of the gyre as an unstoppable, terrifying dynamic force. A Revelation with Yeats. The falcon cannot hear the falconer; Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold; Mere anarchy is loosed upon the world, The blood-dimmed tide is loosed, and everywhere. A gyre, in his poem, destabilizes the relation between human and nonhuman others, beginning as an aerial vortex and expanding to an oceanic “blood-dimmed tide. 1865–1939. The rancher cannot break her mare. high in the air c. She turned him down six times. Nov 21, 2023 · ''The Second Coming'' by Yeats explored various themes and was a way for Yeats to discuss his theory of history. Irrational streams of blood are staining earth; Empedocles has thrown all things about; Hector is dead and there's a light in Troy; We that look on but subpolar gyre. Volume 13 of the Collected Edition of the Works of W. So when one of his crew insults our daughter, we lose our mind. Turning and turning in the widening gyre. Honors Degree in English and Communications. It must be noted, that no one can accurately predict the future of the Yeats photographed in 1903 by Alice Boughton. Troubles my sight: somewhere in sands of the desert. The title invokes his most notorious concept (usually pronounced with a hard 'g'). The speaker describes a nightmarish scene: the falcon, turning in a widening “gyre” (spiral), cannot hear the falconer; “Things fall apart; the center cannot hold”; anarchy is loosed upon the world; “The blood-dimmed tide is loosed, and everywhere / The ceremony of innocence is drowned. What was at the beginning of Yeats further compares the martyrs to a ‘stone’ “troubling the living streams”, symbolic for the disruption of life's serenity. While one tends to dominant, the other is always implied and weakly present. Jul 3, 2019 · Yeats and 'The Symbolism of Poetry'. 45. In addition to his poetic oeuvre, Yeats developed an intricate symbolic and geometric system based on the cycles of the moon in order to explain the history and the human personality. See my article ‘Yeats’s Canons’, E in C, 60/3 (July 2010), 242-64, for a discussion of these habits of canon-formation and de-formation in the poet’s career. 1865. Yeats's conception of cosmos is idealist: ultimately everything is mind or spirit, and reality is created by spirits perceiving each other (§5. ” Put simply, "The Gyres" is about an old man on the verge of death, as he reflects on his existence and the destruction of civilization around him. Alludes to the Book of Revelations (The Sphinx) "A shape with lion body and the head of a man," Semantics associated with a Lion hunting are used to imply the Since humans began writing things down, books and literature have served as a living, growing repository for consciousness. The Second Coming William Butler Yeats. In 'Two Songs from a Play' the initial impression of a speaker's stance of Olympian aloofness, and of a powerful stress on cyclical recurrence is very. Most of these symbolic patterns (gyres, lunar stages) are an important part of the poems and the texts he wrote in the second half of his life. Not cool. Mar 15, 2021 · Falcon/Pinterest. Yeats in a Time of Turmoil Yeats wrote "The Second Coming" in the ruins of post-WWI Europe, when established norms and world order were in upheaval. A major case in point is the large double cone with dates William Butler Yeats. This will be followed by a brief mention of some examples of Yeats's s work which predate the development of his Gyre theory but suggest the use of related ideas. The Mask serves as a device not only for personal disguise and protection but also Given Yeats’s declaration that all the symbols of the relationships between wheels and gyres ‘can be thought of as the symbols of the relations of men and women and of the birth of children’ (AV B 211), it is understandable that the sex of the Daimon is seen as an important sexual metaphor within the System. – Roquebrune-Cap-Martin, 1939. stanza added probably in 1930-31. Further details are available at: Scribner's/Simon and Schuster's page where the price is listed as $26. Others took pains to assure their readers that Yeats was known as a very sane man. The early Greek philosopher, Empedocles, had also developed a philosophy based on antithesis, as had William Blake, whilst Giambatista Yeats started his long literary career as a romantic poet and gradually evolved into a modernist poet. B. Yeats was born and educated in Dublin but spent his childhood in County Sligo. As the underlying poetic mode, symbolism brings forty-six pages of notes to sixty-two pages of poems in The Wind Among the Reeds. századi irodalom egyik kiemelkedő alakja. Historical eras overlap, one ending as the next one begins. vince many that [Yeats had] gone unquestionably, though perhaps serviceably, mad. 99. III. Yeats and the Idea of a Theatre: The Early Abbey Theatre in Theory and Practice New Haven, CT and London Yale University Press 1976 [Google Scholar], Early Abbey Theatre, 358, makes the interesting observation that Abbey audiences experienced their participation in theatre as a culturally significant act, as the A Vision is a philosophical work by the renowned Irish poet and playwright William Butler Yeats originally published in 1925. The ceremony of innocence is drowned; The best lack all conviction, while the worst. The most prominent are the subtropical gyres, which ring subtropical high -pressure systems, and the subpolar gyres, which enclose areas of low atmospheric pressure over the oceans. He believed that these gyres or eras of history tended to fall into roughly 2,000-year periods. 1). “The theory of history articulated in A Vision centers on a diagram composed of two conic helixes (“gyres”), one situated inside the other, so that the widest part of one cone occupies the same plane as the tip of the other cone, and Abstract. Bookpunk holds that establishing a unique and meaningful connection to our universal literary heritage is the inalienable right of every human on the planet. There is an alliteration in the phrase, “Fish, flesh, or fowl. Among other things, "The Second Coming" takes its imagery from Yeats's book, A Vision, a zodiac of sorts that he developed with his wife through "visitations" and automatic writing. If any single idea can be taken from this complex and esoteric system, it is that all things, from the human personality to history… (Duddy, 2004, p. “The Second Coming,” of course, refers to the Christian prophecy in the Bible’s Book of Revelation that Jesus will return to reign over Earth in the end times. Perhaps Pater's famous phrase about burning 'with a hard gem-like flame' is the source of the image. január 28. Yeats and the Gyre HUM 2213: British and American Literature II Spring 2015 Dr. Christian epoch and the violent birth of a new age. Gyres apper in many of Yeats's poems. symbols the major symbols ar e- t he r ose, the towe r, the. In Yeats's "The Second Coming," "gyre" is used to represent the swirling, turning landscape of life itself. When he began publishing poetry in the 1880 s, his poems had a lyrical, romantic style, and they focused on love, longing and loss, and Irish myths. From this Yeats derived his notions of the subjective and the objective, the former moving towards an affirmation of self and a belief in many gods, and the latter moving towards a denial of self and a belief in one god. As one gyre widens, the other narrows, until a crisis point is reached every two thousand years. Mainly it represents the cyclic movement of history and subjectivity and objectivity of human soul. Ë Asking the sages to "perne in gyre," the speaker distinguishes between the cyclical work of nature (birth, life and death) and It adumbrates Yeats’s treatment of the Historical Cycles in the next section. " The Celtic and Hermetic apocalyptic symbols in certain poems are also discussed here. Apart from that, the poem begins with a litote. We’ve tried to reason with Phil Leotardo. 0, §5. Yeats actively sought illustration work and commissions for his brother, including the illustration of his own poems and prose, commissions that forced Jack Yeats to learn on the job from time to time. Yeats Gyre theory as well as many other strange aspects of his life and personality has led to conclusions of mental instability. Irrational streams of blood are staining earth; Empedocles has thrown all things about; Hector is dead and there’s a light in Troy; We that look on but laugh in Sep 29, 2014 · The word ‘gyre’ was first utilized in Yeats’ book A Vision that is based on history and metaphysics. He belonged to the Protestant, Anglo-Irish minority that had controlled the economic, political, social, and cultural life of Ireland since Dec 5, 2016 · The meaning of GYRE is a circular or spiral motion or form; especially : a giant circular oceanic surface current. 1. He was a driving force behind the Irish Literary Revival, and along with Lady Gregory founded the Abbey Theatre, serving as its chief Aug 9, 2019 · Christian Prophecy. 2. They rotate in opposite directions, constantly spiraling in and spiraling out. Now that gyre was reaching the widest part of Accordingly, The One Mind, the Great Vehicle or Great Wheel and theWorld has a similar analogy, which make a system of symbolism, so called“Yeatsian gyre theory. William Butler Yeats [a] (13 June 1865 – 28 January 1939) was an Irish poet, dramatist and writer, and one of the foremost figures of 20th-century literature. B. "*. This may be categorized as a masculine symbol. When a vast image out of Spiritus Mundi. It argues that the poem's meaning depends critically 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. of Christ. 380) The Gyres. I think that while these ideas may have merit, I believe that if we are to accept the yin yang, or the angel and devil conscience, we have to allow the thought that the plane may be gyres to exist and see it in the same light as these other theories. gyre, in oceanography and climatology, a vast circular system made up of ocean currents that spirals about a central point. One can get immortality by Nor is there singing school but studying. A specific term (often capitalised as "Cycle") referring to a complete round of 28 incarnations. Both the ‘male’ and ‘female’ gyre contain one forward moving component and one backward moving component. For example, the poet uses the words 'widening gyre Apr 11, 2024 · Instead you have – politically speaking, at least – what Yeats called a Widening Gyre, where a steady stream of extremist candidates, each very attractive to their party base, pull the overall electorate into a greater and greater state of polarization. In this system, Yeats conceived of history as evolving through the interaction of interpenetrating 'gyres', or cones, each gyre representing the development of a civilization and its predominant tendencies. Jun 22, 2020 · Yeats’s interest in the ‘gyre’, the theory that history repeated itself (also present in ‘The Second Coming’), is relevant here, and the ‘lurching’ of the ghostly figure of Robert Artisson is strikingly similar to the ‘slouching’ of the mysterious sphinx-like creature at the end of ‘The Second Coming’. Yeats, the Irish poet, had a theory of history that centered on the movement of gyres. Yeats’s father, John Butler Yeats, was a barrister who The article makes an analysis of the origin and development of Yeats’s Doctrine of the Mask and its embodiment in his poems. He had a life-long interest in mysticism and spiritualism. Yeats wrote an essay entitled ‘The Symbolism of Poetry’ in 1900 in response to Arthur Dec 7, 1995 · A gyre, as William Butler Yeats saw it, is two cones that are inextricably connected and dependent upon each other: the base of one is the apex of the other. A. reviewer commented that, in combination with the late plays, it was likely to "con. An allusion to Yeats’ Gyre Theory, the verb ‘trouble’ brings a negative connotations to the stone’s function; the martys have casted a ripple effect upon the citizens of Ireland by attempting to alter fate. He received the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1923. Michael Whitworth suggests that, “’Bethlehem’ connects with Yeats’s theory of historical cycles: we can re-read ‘The Second Coming’ in the light of the later poem ‘The Gyres’ but more importantly, we can re-read it in the light of Yeats’s prose work A Vision in which he expounds his theory” (Whitworth 128). Sep 12, 2013 · The poet’s occult theory, as expressed in A Vision, is best summarised through his theory of the gyres, although he was not the first to present time, space and the very origins of being through opposites. The third paper considers Yeats’s debts to the East, especially Buddhist and Hindu thought, while the fourth looks at his ideas about the dream-state, the nature of Yeats ’ gyre has a double cone functioning on the principle of duality, that is, the apex of one cone is the base of the other and vice versa, which subscribes to the complementary yet opposite draws its imagery from Yeats’s developing theories concerning cycles of history and the gyres, which later become the focus in A Vision. He believed that a new "rough beast" was Jul 12, 2018 · The gyre is an imaginative visualization of Yeats's theory of history. . The cycle he was living in at the time (1919) began with the birth of Jesus Christ. Turning and turning in the widening gyre Yeats’ notion about the nature of history is very different from the traditional one. Yeats wrote “The Second Coming Mar 15, 2020 · We would like to show you a description here but the site won’t allow us. Paul came out in 2008, and is now available in paperback and e-book. His early writing follows the conventions of romantic verse, utilizing familiar rhyme schemes However, apart from the Biblical elements, Yeats also describes his ideas of history. He wrote countless poems to her, to no avail. Summary. 13. Yeats’s The Second Coming!" Yeats theory of 'gyres' and human life cycles, links to the idea of The Second Coming Christ and that history repeats itself. On June 16, 1885, Yeats and several friends formed the Dublin Hermetic Order. Yeats’s Primary and Antithetical man can be compared to Jung’s anima and animus. John P. They stand for the seal of Solomon used in magic. Yeats, we find the presence of 'the sword'. W. Apr 11, 2024 · Things Fall Apart (Part 1) We are all Tony Soprano today. William Butler Yeats opens his 1920 poem, "The Poem Analyzed by Elise Dalli. sun, the moon, the Yeats’s history theory and his configuration of the gyres are powerfully linked to this vision, as can be seen in many poems, such as "Leda and the Swan," "Demon and the Beast," "The Gyres," "Solomon and the Witch," and "The Second Coming. The idea of creativity linked in flaming unity to destruction underlies Yeats's whole treatment of the poets of the 'Tragic Generation'. Like the tower,' The Gyre' is also a major symbol. Oct 24, 2022 · used a number of symbols in his poetry. Jan 11, 2016 · The ‘gyre’ metaphor Yeats employs in the first line (denoting circular motion and repetition) is a nod to Yeats’s mystical belief that history repeats itself in cycles. Irish Giant's Classic Take on Key Poetic Device. The following essay examines an area where spiritualism, eugenic theory, and criminology cross paths in the writings of Cesare Lombroso, and Yeats’s response to his work. The falcon cannot hear the falconer; The cyclone cannot feel the air; The drain disavows the water—. This theory is rooted in a notion that all historical processes entail contrary motions. work, such in lyric poem, "The Second Coming" is viewed as a prophetic poem that envisions the close of the. We’ve tried to maintain the cooperative institutions of Our Thing. Monuments of its own magnificence; And therefore I have sailed the seas and come. MA Creative Writing Dissertation – margotfwilson@gmail. ing and ing in the en gyre The con not the con; fall a; the tre not ; any is up the , The -dimmed is , and ery The eny of no is ; The lack contion, the Are of sion insi. The poem remains famous and widely read today. It points out that Yeats,aiming at establishing his self-confidence and restoring the Irish people’s self-esteem and self-confidence,uses the Mask to differentiate self and anti-self. The roof’s an outright liar. He suggested that history moved in cycles, and through this poem he weaved both mythology and his theory about history together. ‘The Second Coming’. Yeats used this idea of a gyre in his philosophical writings and as a major image in his poetry. ‘Dove or Swan’ looks at the application of Yeats’s gyres as Historical Cycles within the Great Year, in periods of 2000 and 1000 years. And from here it is only a small leap to Yeats's theory that the rhythms of history and civilization move in the আরো পড়ুন: A dialogue of body and soul Bangla Summary (বাংলায়) A gyre is something that starts from the center of a circle and goes up like a conic. From the double cone of the gyre, thread spins from just one place at any given moment, but that place always contains within May 13, 2011 · THE GYRES! the gyres! Old Rocky Face, look forth; Things thought too long can be no longer thought, For beauty dies of beauty, worth of worth, And ancient lineaments are blotted out. But the guy won’t take “yes” for an answer. And the radius of the circle increases with time intervals. június 13. Jun 13, 2013 · Built on gyres, and underlying poems such as The Second Coming , Yeats’ system is explored here, which also touches on Georgie Yeats’ pivotal role in its creation. Yeats became heavily involved with hermeticist and theosophical beliefs, and in 1900 Yeats conceptualized history as a series of interpenetrating gyres. For Yeats, however, the word “gyre”—which he pronounced with a hard G sound—had additional symbolic significance. The gyre represents the cycles of history, which are always In the 1880s and 1890s, W. It was a confused and mystical idea that inspired some great lyrical verse, so the confusion doesn’t The title of the poem, ‘Sailing to Byzantium’ is a reference to the metaphorical journey of an old man toward the center of classicism. ) ír költő, drámaíró, elbeszélő, irodalmi Nobel-díjas ( 1923 ), a 20. gyre, the wheel, the sword, the sea, the bird, the tree, the. Yeats used the phrase "the second birth" instead of "the Second Jan 11, 2021 · What is Yeats gyre theory? I t simply is. ” Yeats imagined a spiral, which he preferred to call a gyre) or whirling cone. William Butler Yeats is widely considered to be one of the greatest poets of the 20th century. Besides, “Byzantium” is a metonym for the art of ancient Byzantium. deep in a forest d. By Kimiko Hahn. 2). In other words, if you enjoyed the choices America had in the 2016 presidential election This essay looks at how Yeats consistently associated what he conceived of as “Eastern” thought with themes of rebirth and fresh beginnings, as well as a form of disinterestedness. To the holy city of Byzantium. " Where is this happening? a. ”. It looks specifically at the 2000 years before the birth of Christ, and then, in more detail, the 2000 years following. His first volumes of poetry, influenced by the symbolism of William Yeats was not profoundly interested, or with a view of the soul's evolution different to that which Yeats imagined, as will be shown when Yeats's own descriptions of gyres are dealt with later. He studied poetry in his youth, and from an early age was Download scientific diagram | William Butler Yeats's notion of the "gyre" adopted from (Mann, 2012: 6) According to Yeats, life is mortal but it can be immortal. We’ve tried to compromise. At one point he married her daughter in an effort to get closer to his true love. Yeats claimed that she was often inhabited by spirits who came in order to describe a universal system of cyclical birth, based around a turning gyre. One of the greatest poets of the 20th century and a recipient of the Nobel Prize, William Butler Yeats spent his early childhood in Dublin and Sligo before moving with his parents to London. Jung’s theory of the opposites bears resemblance to Yeats’s, for according to it the individual psyche strives to connect to the unconscious through a struggle with the hidden forces of the psyche, such as the anima and the animus. In the poetry of W. Apr 28, 2011 · W. But Yeats had his own mystical view of the history and future end of the world, embodied in his image of the “gyres,” cone-shaped spirals that intersect so The poem was written in 1919 in the aftermath of the First World War [4] and the beginning of the Irish War of Independence in January 1919, which followed the Easter Rising in April 1916, and before the British government had decided to send in the Black and Tans to Ireland. For example, WBY recommended the services of his brother to the editor Frederick Langbridge in September 1893 to After death, nature recedes, and spiritual thought takes over, so that what was dark is now light, and the lunar light is now dark, embodying a version of one of Yeats's favorite fragments from Heraclitus: “Mortals are immortals and immortals are mortals, the one living the other's death and dying the other's life. Yeats A Vision A (1925), also edited by Margaret Mills Harper and Catherine E. A general term referring to the modified repetition of the gyre, and any of the cyclical phenomena which inform the paradigm, such as the natural cycles of the day, the month and the year. This nexus is evident not only in his early poetry adopting Indian personae and themes, but also in the introductions he wrote in the 1930s for works by Shri However, readers familiar with other of Yeats’s poems and, particularly, with his cosmogony (as put forth in A Vision), will recognize the gyre as the hourglass shape that Yeats considers as representative of all life. Meter Syllables. His longstanding fascination with mysticism led him to elaborate his own theory of history. Yeats's early poetry, particularly The Wind Among the Reeds (1899), is often considered ‘symbolist’. In many instances, Yeats and his “instructors” have compounded the confusion through their manner of presenting the materials. Study with Quizlet and memorize flashcards containing terms like In lines 1 and 2 of "The Second Coming," a falcon is said to be "Turning and turning in the widening gyre. The ultimate reality is symbolized as a unified Sphere, close to the concept of God or to the spiritual totality of the cosmos (§10. Yeats’s intentions, that is, seem to me to be more the proper objects of critical study than they are binding instructions demanding to be obeyed. among these. The poem's title makes reference to the Biblical reappearance. Some of the symbolism used by William Butler Yeats in the poem 'The Second Coming' relates back to the ideas of stability and instability. While much of Yeats’s work Ë One of Yeats' theory centers on" the gyres, which are growing and dwindling vortices (or more commonly double vortices). The best people, the speaker says May 30, 2020 · We would like to show you a description here but the site won’t allow us. Yeats uses YEATS VIEW OF HISTORY: 'THE CONTEMPLATION OF RUIN' 31. Consult your investment advisor before making any investment decisions. This paper examines the metaphoric structure of Yeats' poem The Second Coming in the light of the Lakoff-Johnson-Turner theory of metaphor. William Butler Yeats (1865-1939) is one of the most significant poets in the English language of the twentieth century. When william butler yeats published A Vision in its final form in 1938, one. in a large, dark room, When he wrote "Sailing to Byzantium," Yeats believed that the world of art and thought is superior to the life of THE GYRES! the gyres! Old Rocky Face, look forth; Things thought too long can be no longer thought, For beauty dies of beauty, worth of worth, And ancient lineaments are blotted out. 9 They are all printed as part of The Tower volume in the Collected Poems. He wants it ALL. But the gyre is ‘widening’: it is getting further and further away from its centre, its point of origin. Mar 19, 2023 · The Second Coming. YEAT'S VIEW OF HISTORY: 'THE CONTEMPLATION OF RUIN' 35. Yeats’s theory of the gyres is the creation of Yeats’s magic imagination. Apr 11, 2024 · Epsilon Theory will not accept liability for any loss or damage, including without limitation to any loss of profit, which may arise directly or indirectly from use of or reliance on such information. in a small cage b. The gyres! the gyres! Old Rocky Face, look forth; Things thought too long can be no longer thought, For beauty dies of beauty, worth of worth, And ancient lineaments are blotted out. 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. O sages standing in God's holy fire. com 12 fYeats Considered as the Archetypal Fool: A Tantric Reading of The Herne’s Egg Margot Wilson MPhil (R) Further, the opportunity takes place upon the highest mountain, reflecting the highest attainable human state as coming together of gyres - as One. Yeats believed in a theory of history based on 2000-year cycles. William Butler Yeats (Sadymount, Dublin mellett, 1865. The widening gyre (symbol) "Gyre" is actually a scientific term used to refer to a vortex located over the air or sea, and it usually refers to systems of circulating ocean currents. Reel shadows of the indignant desert birds. This work is influenced by the changes he saw around him in Europe and beyond. Then two such cones were drawn and considered to pass like the human soulthrough a cycle from Yeats is generally considered one of the few writers who completed their greatest works after being awarded the Nobel Prize; such works include The Tower (1928) and The Winding Stair and Other Poems (1929). Magic and occult theory is also important elements of his own in Yeats's. The poet compares the process of history with these wheels and gears. In fact, this important theory is deep-rooted in Bible and it is not difficult for us to trace back to its originals—Christian Sep 22, 2005 · A brief introduction to the principles of Taoism will be followed by an exploration of A Vision, Yeats's s central philosophical work, which began to take shape in 1917. The theory of Descartes with regard to vortices was summed up by Mahaffy: The Second Coming! Hardly are those words out. In one such love poem to Gonne, titled “He Wishes His Beloved Were Dead,” Yeats wrote: This strange, dream-like and violent world is based upon alternate ageing and juvenescence, and Yeats claims that the ‘student of A Vision will understand it at once’ ( AV B 189n). Irrational streams of blood are staining earth; Empedocles has thrown all things about; Hector is dead and there’s a light in Troy; We that look on but laugh in The complexities of the historical gyres or cones in A Vision constitute problems with which most scholars or students of Yeats have wrestled, often in vain. Yeats conceptualized history as a series of interpenetrating gyres. Jan 22, 2007 · Flannery Flannery James W W. the widening gyre. [ 9 ] The word 'gyre' is used in many of his poems, including Sailing to Byzantium [ 10 ] . Irrational streams of blood are staining earth; Empedocles has thrown all things about; Hector is dead and there's a light in Troy; We that look on but laugh in William Butler Yeats (born June 13, 1865, Sandymount, Dublin, Ireland—died January 28, 1939, Roquebrune-Cap-Martin, France) was an Irish poet, dramatist, and prose writer, one of the greatest English-language poets of the 20th century. Perdigao January 30, 2015 Epicness Indeterminancy • Charles Darwin, Karl Marx, Sigmund Freud, Albert Einstein, Max Planck, Werner Heisenberg • Darwin: challenge to Biblical literalism, idea of authority • Marx: people’s actions controlled by economic system, altered ideas about human nature • Freud Oct 11, 2018 · 1. DN-0071801, Chicago Daily News negatives collection, Chicago History Museum. Drawing on his engagement with mysticism and the occult, Yeats presents an exploration of reality, the cyclical nature of history, the soul’s evolution, and the role of the artist. However, the poem is a bit more complicated than Dec 7, 2023 · Yeats proposed to Gonne six times over the course of his life. In Autobiographies, Yeats recalls his conviction as a young man that the world had become “a bundle of fragments,” but he admits that he did not foresee “the growing murderousness of the world” and quotes the first stanza of “The Second Coming” to emphasize the point (163– 166). As in the gold mosaic of a wall, Come from the holy fire, perne in a gyre, And be the singing-masters of my soul. 99 and the e-book is $14. In this poem — ironically, a product of European thought — Yeats describes an apocalyptic vision in which the world collapses into anarchy because of an internal flaw in humanity. Because of WW1 there will be a WW2. It is only in its large sweep that Yeats's philosophy is necessary to understand the poetry. In the poem, 'The Gyres', for example, we need to know only its barest outlines. Rafferty. oa tb nc bz fz jd se bm ul ap