In Memory of W. B. Yeats

by W. H. Auden

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Summary and analysis of W.H. Auden's "In Memory of W.B. Yeats," including detailed interpretation of specific lines and identification of key symbols

Summary:

W.H. Auden's "In Memory of W.B. Yeats" pays tribute to the Irish poet while reflecting on the nature of poetry and its impact. The poem is divided into three sections: the first describes Yeats's death, the second meditates on poetry's role in a troubled world, and the third celebrates Yeats's enduring influence. Key symbols include the "healing fountain" representing poetic inspiration and the "frozen brook" symbolizing the stasis of death.

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Could you provide a summary and analysis of Auden's 'In Memory of W.B. Yeats'? What is the meaning of lines 17, 18-21, 33, 34-36, 36-40, and 47?

Specific lines for analysis: 17, 18-21, 33, 'The parish of rich women', 34-36, 36-40, 47 'all the dogs of Europe bark'

Auden wrote this poem shortly after Yeats’s death in 1939, as a tribute to one of the most influential, talented poets in English literature. Divided into three sections, the poem is both a typical elegy (funeral poem) and a meditation on poetry itself.

Section I imagines Yeats on his deathbed, supposing that his great mind faded away. The speaker also suggests that while some will remember the death of this great writer, others will barely notice.

Section II differs from the first in tone, audience, and form. The speaker directly addresses Yeats, chiding him for his flaws and mistakes. This chastising tone could indicate the speaker’s frustration that Yeats was an imperfect man rather than the idealized hero Auden and others imagined Yeats to be. This section also suggests that while Yeats was a fantastic poet, his poems—like all poems—may not have achieved what he desired them to do.

Section 3 returns to the formal style of the first section. However, the repeated quatrains underscore Auden’s purpose: paying respectful tribute to Yeats is important to the speaker. Despite the speaker’s earlier dismissal of poetry’s significance, this section reflects the beauty and necessity of Yeats’s contribution to humanity. The speaker implores Yeats to “teach the free men how to praise” from beyond the grave.

Line 17: The “current of feeling” is his consciousness. He “became his admirers” because his consciousness will survive through their continued study of his work.

Lines 18-21: The news of Yeats’s death will have reached people across the world, many of whom will know little about him. This opens up the possibility that some might remember him not as he actually was but as a footnote in an average day.

Line 33: The speaker is accusing Yeats of womanizing, like many famous men.

Lines 34–41: Many of Yeats’s poems were tied to his home country of Ireland. The speaker suggests that Yeats’s poetry did not fix the turmoil in Ireland that occurred throughout his life. Nevertheless, the poems persist even in Yeats’s absence.

Final Note: The “dogs of Europe” alludes to a famous line from Shakespeare’s Julius Caesar, “let slip the dogs of war.” Remember, this poem was written in 1939, on the cusp of World War II. Auden is referring to the growing hostility among European governments. He mentions this international discord as one of the reasons why poetry like Yeats’s is needed in the world.

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Summarize and analyze each stanza of Auden's "In Memory of W.B. Yeats". Who are the "rich women" and "dogs"?

It sounds like you're writing an essay on this poem, which is a lament, or elegy, by W.H. Auden for the Irish poet W.B. Yeats. It's a big poem, but I'll try to get you started on your answer, and make sure you understand the parts you're unclear on.

The poem is, of course, divided into stanzas, but it is also broken into three sections, which is a more useful way to look at it. Traditionally, all elegies are in three sections: a lament for the dead; a section praising the dead; and a section consoling the reader. Auden's poem follows this structure.

Part I ("he disappeared in the dead of winter") uses pathetic fallacy to demonstrate how all of nature mourned the "dark cold day" of Yeats's death. The cold and the snow that lay on earth represent the feeling of coldness that came over all as a reaction to Yeat's death.

There is an element of consolation creeping into this section—"the wolves ran on through the evergreen forests"—suggesting that not the entire world was affected by this one death. But Auden refocuses the reader on the poem's subject: "for him it was his last afternoon as himself." He uses metaphor to depict Yeats as a city whose "provinces" revolted and "squares became empty." As he died, "silence invaded the suburbs" and the city of the poet was emptied.

Instead of being contained as himself, then, Yeats is now "scattered among a hundred cities," seemingly a suggestion that the constitutent parts of his soul have been divided up among others. He "became his admirers" in that all he believed lives on only in them, now, not in him. Auden uses anaphora to enumerate the many who will "think of this day" in the future as a sad day, the repeated "and" serving to demonstrate just how many lament Yeats's death.

Part II is notably brief. It describes Yeats succinctly as "silly like us," and emphasizes the key point that "your gift survived it all." When Auden mentions "the parish of rich women" here, he is referring to the upper class women (grouped as a "parish") who misinterpreted or misunderstood Yeats, particularly those in "mad Ireland" who could not understand Yeats's position on the Irish question. Yeats's poetry, Auden says in this stanza, was caused by his beliefs, by his "hurt," and will survive him; but it is not poetry that makes things happen, but the things that happen to us which make poetry happen.

In Part III, the consolation, the structure and meter echoes a funeral eulogy or memorial poem on a gravestone: "William Yeats is laid to rest." As a consoling section, this one is interesting because it emphasizes the "nightmare of the dark" in which Europe is lying, "sequestered in its hate." By "the dogs of Europe," Auden is referring to the warring nations who, at the time of writing (1940) were launching into World War Two. Where Auden finds consolation is in the plea that the "poet" will still "with your unconstraining voice" persuade us that it is still possible to "rejoice." Though Yeats may be dead, and "human unsuccess" rife, Auden prays that the "healing fountain" will start up in the current state of chaos, and memory of Yeats's poetry will "teach the free man how to praise."

I think I've covered all the lines you've asked about specifically, although my copy of the poem isn't numbered. Hopefully this gives you a good starting point.

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