Michael Robartes and the Dancer
WB Yeats
1921, reprinted 1998
Michael Robartes and the Dancer" is a collection of poems by WB Yeats. It was self-published in 1921 and many of the poems seem to me to be inspired by WWI. In the introduction, Yeats claims his main inspiration was the work he was doing translating a philosophy text.
The first few poems, including the title poems, which has the most obvious claim to philosophical inspiration, are written as dialogues between a man and woman. In one, they debate mind/body dualism and the way some men, including some philosophers, view women as all body, no mind. In another, a woman seems to describe at length an orgasm so good it reminded her of the creation of the world. Later, in a poem meant to be a prayer for his infant daughter during a particularly rough storm, Yeats wishes for her to be somewhat beautiful, but not so much that people only value her for her looks, and to be good at keeping her opinions to herself so she doesn't get in fights.
A couple of the poems are dated, either 1916 or 1919. In one, Yeats mentions several people he knew who died, I think during WWI but perhaps from other causes. Those dead friends' names then go on to show up in several more poems, as he continues to think about them.
The showpiece of this very slim volume us "The Second Coming", which was indeed the reason I sought this book out at all. If I found TS Eliot too obscure, and The Waste Land's commentary on WWI too opaque, "The Second Coming" offers no such difficulty. It is direct and explicit, and in a hundred years has lost none of its urgency. It is not, fortunately, trite or sentimental, but well-said in a way that's made it part of our common language to describe unsettled times. I've seen almost every line of this poem quoted, and so have you, and yet put together they remain a powerful description of a world falling apart.
The first few poems, including the title poems, which has the most obvious claim to philosophical inspiration, are written as dialogues between a man and woman. In one, they debate mind/body dualism and the way some men, including some philosophers, view women as all body, no mind. In another, a woman seems to describe at length an orgasm so good it reminded her of the creation of the world. Later, in a poem meant to be a prayer for his infant daughter during a particularly rough storm, Yeats wishes for her to be somewhat beautiful, but not so much that people only value her for her looks, and to be good at keeping her opinions to herself so she doesn't get in fights.
A couple of the poems are dated, either 1916 or 1919. In one, Yeats mentions several people he knew who died, I think during WWI but perhaps from other causes. Those dead friends' names then go on to show up in several more poems, as he continues to think about them.
The showpiece of this very slim volume us "The Second Coming", which was indeed the reason I sought this book out at all. If I found TS Eliot too obscure, and The Waste Land's commentary on WWI too opaque, "The Second Coming" offers no such difficulty. It is direct and explicit, and in a hundred years has lost none of its urgency. It is not, fortunately, trite or sentimental, but well-said in a way that's made it part of our common language to describe unsettled times. I've seen almost every line of this poem quoted, and so have you, and yet put together they remain a powerful description of a world falling apart.
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