简论WB叶芝早期诗歌中所体现的精神矛盾.pdfVIP

Chapter One Introduction 1.1 W. B. Yeats and His Literary Achievements William Butler Yeats (1865-1939) is widely acknowledged as one of the greatest English poets and dramatists of the twentieth century. As the winner of Noble Prize for literature in 1923, Yeats is honored by T. S. Eliot as “the greatest poet of our age-certainly the greatest in this language” (Stead, 1986: 45). The Royal Swedish Academy thinks highly of him “for his always inspired poetry, which in a highly artistic form gives expression to the spirit of a whole nation”. Yeats was also a dramatist, an Irish National theatre founder, and a senator. No one but Yeats has done so many occupations; his experience may give a hint why he makes such fabulous achievements. Yeats lives a legendary life, as his life is woven with the times and his country. He combines his fate with the fate of Ireland, his literary creation with the revival of Irish literature, and his personal life with his artistic creation. Yeats was born as the eldest son of his family on June 13, 1865, in Dublin, Ireland. His grandfather is the Reverend William Butler Yeats, a deeply orthodox Rector of the Church of Ireland; his father is John Butler Yeats, a portrait artist as well as a skeptic. Their conflicting religious belief invokes his continuing quest on the unorthodox disbelief, an eccentric faith somewhere between his grandfather’s orthodox belief and his father’s skeptic. When he was two years old, Yeats’s family moved to London, but he still spent summer times in Sligo. Sligo is a very significant place to Yeats, as Yeats writes that “the place that has really influenced my life the most is Sligo” (Ellmann, 1987: 25). His commute between London and Sligo help