Yeats

It is very rare that an author surpasses his time and continues to engage readers past his own century of creative prime, but along with the likes of Shakespeare and Dickens, William Butler Yeats stands among the few writers whose work has been engraved permanently onto the walls of English literature. It is through Yeats’ exploration of themes such as the passing of time, fragility of human life and the inevitability of death teemed with the exploration of the idea of destruction and its relevance in all societies have enraptured readers of the modern century. Yeats’ writings have immortalised him, so he may never be forgotten by civilisation, and perhaps it is the immortalisation that we as humans aim for, so to search for answers in his work contributes to our longing to live, and his longing to remain.
The rising and setting of the sun is our only constant, time is our only continuum, and the search for more time has lead us to answers of which Yeats has attempted to address. Philosophically, scientifically and religiously, we are all searching for answers on how it is we should spend our time here on earth. It seems that time has almost become taboo as our search for the answer is never a constant, fluid nor discernable outcome. Yeats was one of the many scholars who explored this concept, and perhaps this is why his work continues to engage readers- because it confronts ideas of the concept of time, and the dimensions in which it exists. After examination of his poem ‘The Second Coming’ as a whole, it is evident that Yeats regards time itself as a continuum, repeated and reborn, which gives the reader somewhat of a reassurance that time is uncontrollable and so we should just let it be. The manic phrasing of the poem contributes to this as it mirrors no specific pattern and instead is free verse. At closer examination we can identify how Yeats addresses the continuous time as a fate in which we cannot control. ‘Surely some revelation is at hand; Surely