Political Poems: 'Easter 1916' by W.B. Yeats Close Readings (subscription)
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Yeats’s great poem about the uprising of Irish republicans against British rule on 24 April 1916 marked a turning point in Ireland’s history and in Yeats's career. Through four stanzas Yeats enacts the transfiguration of the movement’s leaders – executed by the British shortly after the event – from ‘motley’ acquaintances to heroic martyrs, and interrogates his own attitude to nationalist violence. Mark and Seamus discuss Yeats’s reflections on the value of political commitment, his embrace of the role of national bard and the origin of the poem’s most famous line.
Read more in the LRB:
Terry Eagleton:
https://www.lrb.co.uk/the-paper/v16/n13/terry-eagleton/spooky
Colm Tóibín:
https://www.lrb.co.uk/the-paper/v38/n07/colm-toibin/after-i-am-hanged-my-portrait-will-be-interesting
Frank Kermode:
https://www.lrb.co.uk/the-paper/v19/n06/frank-kermode/what-he-did
Tom Paulin:
https://www.lrb.co.uk/the-paper/v08/n06/tom-paulin/dreadful-sentiments
Yeats’s great poem about the uprising of Irish republicans against British rule on 24 April 1916 marked a turning point in Ireland’s history and in Yeats's career. Through four stanzas Yeats enacts the transfiguration of the movement’s leaders – executed by the British shortly after the event – from ‘motley’ acquaintances to heroic martyrs, and interrogates his own attitude to nationalist violence. Mark and Seamus discuss Yeats’s reflections on the value of political commitment, his embrace of the role of national bard and the origin of the poem’s most famous line.
Read more in the LRB:
Terry Eagleton:
https://www.lrb.co.uk/the-paper/v16/n13/terry-eagleton/spooky
Colm Tóibín:
https://www.lrb.co.uk/the-paper/v38/n07/colm-toibin/after-i-am-hanged-my-portrait-will-be-interesting
Frank Kermode:
https://www.lrb.co.uk/the-paper/v19/n06/frank-kermode/what-he-did
Tom Paulin:
https://www.lrb.co.uk/the-paper/v08/n06/tom-paulin/dreadful-sentiments