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This seminar will focus on the poems of one of the three greatest poets of the twentieth century, the great Irish poet William Butler Yeats. We will begin with the lovely ort lyrics and love poems, work our way through the sometimes difficult political, philosophical, and mystical poems, and conclude with his marvelous farewell poem, “Under Ben Bulben.”
You will need a “Complete Poems of W.B. Yeats.” The inexpensive Wordsworth edition is satisfactory: there are also Oxford, Macmillan, and Norton editions.
Yeats is the most musical of the great English poets, and I will expect you to learn to read his poems—aloud—as though they were the poems of the most musical of the grear English poets. I will also expect of you faithful attendance, good serious reading and understanding, weekly in-class scribbles, and a seminar paper on some of Yeats’*s poems or some aspect of his poetry.
Our aim—in class and in scribbles and in essays—will be to undersand and enjoy Yeats’s poems. You will need to read the poems—most of them are quite short—over and over. When you understand what a poem says, then you read it some more, to understand it, and to understand it as a poem—with your mind and in your mouth. If you are a writer, give me some of your poems to read, and you and I can talk together about them. If you are musically inclined, listen for melodies that you might find in Yeats’s poems—and come sign them for me.
For the first day’s class, you should have read—and read thoroughly and well—“A Drinking Song,” “Down by the Salley Gardens,”and “Brown Penny.” Three wonderful short poems. |
