From Irishness to Universalism: An Antithetical Study of W.B. Yeats’s Poetry

Antithesis is an inseparable part of Yeats’s poetry. In this study, antithesis is also related to the poet’s social life. It gains its true significance when the reader affirms Blake’s genuineness in saying that there is no progress without opposition. The use of antithesis dominates almost every individual structure of Yeats’s poetry. Yeats’s attempt to represent the complex, intense situation where each theme is examined against its contrary culminates in the multiplicity and maturity of his poems. The presence of antithesis is traced in Yeats’s poetry in terms of the poet’s movement from Irishness to universalism. Among the three stages of Yeats’s development, Early Period, Middle Period and Mature period, the movement happens mostly in the Middle Period. In this second period the poet’s unique nationalism is examined while, at the same time, his inclination towards universalism is shown through three poems. The significant finding is that Yeats’s poetry is seen as a dialectic journey rooted in Irish soil and aspiring towards the cosmopolitan through artistic symbols.

کلیدواژه ها:

nationalism ، Universal Poetry ، antithesis ، Ireland ، Opposition in Poetry