ABSTRACT
An analysis of dates and subject-matter shows some interesting correspondences between the poems and the plays. In both there is the early exploitation of the Celtic legend, with the intention of providing the national mythology that was to unify the imagination of the people. The Abbey Theatre period produced little pure poetry: In the Seven Woods and The Shadowy Waters are slight compared to Responsibilities. There are attempts at topical comedy in competition with Lady Gregory, and Deirdre is a predecessor of Synge's more effective play. Then, under the stimulus of Ezra Pound, there is the development of the Noh-type drama, with which he continues to experiment till the end; with a notable break in the two mystery plays, Calvary and The Resurrection, which are connected with A Vision and his views on the historical significance of Christianity. The Words upon the Window-pane is linked to the political importance attaching to Swift; and, through him, to the political events in Ireland in the period from 1928 onwards. If, as I have suggested, it is necessary to consider the whole of Yeats' poetry together, the poetry of the plays must also be taken together with the poems by reason of the light, though 'somewhat broken' by dramatic form, that each sheds on the other. The lyric impulse is always strong: 'Somebody, Dr Todhunter, the dramatic poet, I think, had said in my hearing that dramatic poetry must be oratorical and I think that I wrote partly to prove that false; but every now and then I lost courage, as it seems, and remembering that I had
In Ireland, for a few years more, we have a popular imagination that is fiery, and magnificent, and tender; so that those of us who wish to write start with a chance that is not given to writers in places where the spring-time of the local life has been forgotten, and the harvest is a memory only, and the straw has been turned into bricks.
