The Tower (book) Summary
William Butler Yeats

Biography EssayWilliam Butler Yeats, probably the twentieth century's greatest poet in English and certainly one of its most complex men, was born in the Dublin suburb of Sandymount on 13 June 1865. H... Read more

William Butler Yeats is widely acknowledged as the greatest poet of the twentieth century. He belonged to the Protestant, Anglo-Irish minority that had controlled the economic, political, social, and ... Read more

William Butler Yeats , probably the twentieth century's greatest poet in English and certainly one of its most complex men, was born in the Dublin suburb of Sandymount on 13 June 1865. He was the elde... Read more

William Butler Yeats , who won the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1923, is widely regarded as the best poet to write in English during the twentieth century. Yet from 1887 to 1905, the first third of h... Read more

In the following essay, Monroe considers ways in which she has “sailed to Byzantium” through her experiences with the theater and literature. “And therefore have I sailed the s... Read more

In the following essay, Ellman examines the poem's history, dramatic structure, and symbolism, and shows how the poem builds upon Yeats's earlier work and experiences. In ‘Sail... Read more

In the following essay, the author refutes the interpretations of the poem as magical rather than religious and as an assertion of immortality through art as “fabricated thing,” and sugg... Read more

Critical Essay by L. C. Parks Source: Parks, L. C. “The Hidden Aspect of ‘Sailing to Byzantium.’ Études Anglaises 16, no. 4 (October-December 1963): 333-44. In the foll... Read more

Critical Essay by David Eggenschwiler Source: Eggenschwiler, David. “Nightingales and Byzantine Birds, Something Less Than Kind.” English Language Notes 8, no. 3 (March 1971): 186-91. ... Read more

In the following essay, the author argues against the generally accepted interpretation of “Sailing to Byzantium” that the “I” of the poem considers that “engrossmen... Read more

In the following essay, Kerbaugh compares the subject matter of two of Yeats's poems. The common subject matter of “Sailing to Byzantium” and “The Tower”—m... Read more

In the following essay, Steinman examines how the source of Yeat's poem may have come from Shakespeare's King Lear. In “The Circus Animals' Desertion,” W. B. Yeat... Read more

In the following essay, Franke examines the symbolic unity of Yeats's two Byzantium poems, and demonstrates how the poems structurally and thematically rely on dialectical tension. In a dialect... Read more