['Accursed who Brings to Light of Day']

No evidence, whether in the form of MS material or in WBY's correspondence, survives to give a definite date for the composition of this quatrain. Circumstantial evidence suggests Apr.–Jun. 1908, and possibly a time in the second half of Apr. or the first half of May. Through the spring of 1908, WBY was in constant correspondence with A.H. Bullen, the publisher of CWVP08, and with Bullen's editorial and publishing assistant, Edith Lister: the eighth and final vol. of the edition as planned was partly dependent on WBY's supplying recent or fugitive material, and it was arranged that the young Allan Wade should prepare an extensive bibliography. But Mr. Yeats has shown his strength fully as much by what is cast away as by what is left; and though bibliophiles will prize to the end their ‘first editions,’ the lettered reader will doubtless prefer the author's ripened judgment. Modern criticism has taken a different direction.