Yeats and World War I
When Henry James asked Yeats to submit a poem for publication in Wharton's collection which was intended to raise money for Belgium refugees, Yeats intended for the poem to state his political position on the "European War". The poem's original title, "To a friend who has asked me to sign his manifesto to the neutral nations," appears, in the words of Jim Haughey, to have a "toysome evasiveness" regarding the politics surrounding the war. Peter McDonald suggests that the changes in the poem's title reflects Yeats's changing political positions from the beginning of the war until its end in 1919 when Yeats publishes The Wild Swans at Coole. Although there are minute variations in the wording of the version published in The Book of the Homeless and the one found in The Wild Swans at Coole, the poem's overall form remained the same even as the title changed. In the first two lines of the poem, Yeats states that it is better for a "poet to keep his mouth shut" than to enter into debates about wars and politics, feeling that a poet should speak only about traditional lyric subjects and leave the war to soldiers and politicians.
Tim Kendall, in The Oxford handbook of British and Irish war poetry, suggests that Yeats's alternatives to the subject of war stated in lines 5-6, are the more traditional subjects of poetry which the poet finds suitable material, yet Kendall sees the reversion of the subject back to Yeats's generic topics as "self-unwriting". The mention of the word "silent" in the title published in Wharton's collection, appears contrary to the construction of poetry or the poetic voice. In the poem "Politics", Yeats begins the poem where "On being asked for a War Poem" finishes with the opening lines:
- How can I, that girl standing there,
- My attention fix
- On Roman or on Russian
- Or on Spanish politics?
Although "Politics" describes a different political situation facing the world in the 1930s, Yeats again chooses not to focus on politics but the "girl standing there."
Read more about this topic: On Being Asked For A War Poem
Famous quotes containing the words yeats, world and/or war:
“We are closed in, and the key is turned
On our uncertainty;”
—William Butler Yeats (1865–1939)
“We placed the wreaths upon the splended granite sarcophagus, and at its feet, and felt that only the earthly robe we loved so much was there. The pure, tender, loving spirit which loved us so tenderly, is above us—loving us, praying for us, and free from all suffering and woe—yes, that is a comfort, and that first birthday in another world must have been a far brighter one than any in this poor world below!”
—Victoria (1819–1901)
“There is something to be said for government by a great aristocracy which has furnished leaders to the nation in peace and war for generations; even a Democrat like myself must admit this. But there is absolutely nothing to be said for government by a plutocracy, for government by men very powerful in certain lines and gifted with the “money touch,” but with ideals which in their essence are merely those of so many glorified pawnbrokers.”
—Theodore Roosevelt (1858–1919)