The Evolution of Yeats's Poetic Theory, 1886-1917

Abstract

<p>The aim of this thesis is to demonstrate that Yeats's articles, reviews, and essays, spanning the years 1185-1911, accurately describe the evolution of his theory of Unity. The Image,which he stressed in his critical work, was one that he forged for Ireland as an national ideal, and in his poetry, it was a symbol of Unity. On both national and poetic levels, it represented passion, tragic , gaiety, the heroic anti-self, "perfection of personality" and self-fulfilment, all of which are aspects fundamental to his Doctrine of the Mask, outlined in Per Amica Silentia Lunae(1917). Moreover, we cannot fully understand the metamorphosis of the Image without considering various influences: Blake, Shelley, the Rhymers, The Hermetic Order of the Golden Dawn, and Mythology. These influences, combined with the cultural situation in Ireland, thus gave rise to the matrix of ideas premised in his essays, reviews, and articles, with clear effects on his poetry and drama. Furthermore, what evolves from these premises is a literary tradition in Ireland, a cyclic theory of history (Unity of Era and Culture being correlative to Unity of Being), a key to interpreting the universe, a psychology of self, and a metaphysics.</p>