William Butler Yeats was born into an Irish-Protestant family on 13 June 1865, in Dublin, the oldest of the four children of the artist John Butler Yeats and Susan Pollexfen Yeats. While he was a young boy, Yeats's family moved to London, but he returned to Dublin when he was nineteen to attend the Metropolitan School of Art and then the Royal Hibernian Academy School. It was during this time (1884-1886) that Yeats realized his talent lay not in painting but in writing.

In London he was one of the organizers of the Rhymers' Club (1891), a group of literary figures who discussed poetry and art. He also became interested in esoteric religion, and joined the Hermetic Students of the Golden Dawn. His interest in folklore, symbol, and myth is evident from his earliest writings on, and his involvement in the Celtic Revival led to, among other things, his founding of...