Throughout his long life, William Butler Yeats -- Irish writer and premier lyric poet in English in this century -- produced important works in every literary genre, works of astonishing range, energy, erudition, beauty, and skill. His early poetry is memorable and moving. His poems and plays of middle age address the human condition with language that has entered our vocabulary for cataclysmic personal and world events. The writings of his final years offer wisdom, courage, humor, and sheer technical virtuosity. T. S. Eliot pronounced Yeats "the greatest poet of our time -- certainly the greatest in this language, and so far as I am able to judge, in any language" and "one of the few whose history is the history of their own time, who are a part of the consciousness of an age which cannot be understood without them."The Yeats Reader is the most comprehensive single volume to display the full range of Yeats's talents. It presents more than one hundred and fifty of his best-known poems -- more than any other compendium -- plus eight plays, a sampling of his prose tales, and excerpts from his published autobiographical and critical writings. In addition, an appendix offers six early texts of poems that Yeats later revised. Also included are selections from the memoirs left unpublished at his death and complete introductions written for a projected collection that never came to fruition. These are supplemented by unobtrusive annotation and a chronology of the life.Yeats was a protean writer and thinker, and few writers so thoroughly reward a reader's efforts to essay the whole of their canon. This volume is an excellent place to begin that enterprise, to renew an old acquaintance with one of world literature's great voices, or to continue a lifelong interest in the phenomenon of literary genius.

Throughout his long life, William Butler Yeats -- Irish writer and premier lyric poet in English in this century -- produced important works in every literary genre, works of astonishing range, energy, erudition, beauty, and skill. His early poetry is memorable and moving. His poems and plays of middle age address the human condition with language that has entered our vocabulary for cataclysmic personal and world events. The writings of his final years offer wisdom, courage, humor, and sheer technical virtuosity. T. S. Eliot pronounced Yeats "the greatest poet of our time -- certainly the greatest in this language, and so far as I am able to judge, in any language" and "one of the few whose history is the history of their own time, who are a part of the consciousness of an age which cannot be understood without them."

ContentsPrefaceChronologyPoemsFrom Crossways (1889)The Song of the Happy ShepherdThe Sad ShepherdThe Cloak, the Boat, and the ShoesThe Indian to his LoveThe Falling of the LeavesEphemeraThe Stolen ChildTo an Isle in the WaterDown by the Salley GardensThe Meditation of the Old FishermanFrom The Rose (1893)To the Rose upon the Rood of TimeFergus and the DruidThe Rose of the WorldThe Lake Isle of InnisfreeThe Pity of LoveThe Sorrow of LoveWhen You are OldThe White BirdsWho goes with Fergus?The Man who dreamed of FaerylandThe Dedication to a Book of Stories selected from the Irish NovelistsThe Lamentation of the Old PensionerThe Two TreesTo Ireland in the Coming Times From The Wind Among the Reeds (1899)The Hosting of the SidheThe Lover tells of the Rose in his HeartThe FishThe Song of Wandering AengusThe Lover mourns for the Loss of LoveHe reproves the CurlewHe remembers forgotten BeautyA Poet to his BelovedHe gives his Beloved certain RhymesTo his Heart, bidding it have no FearThe Cap and BellsHe hears the Cry of the SedgeHe thinks of Those who have spoken Evil of his BelovedThe Lover pleads with his Friend for Old FriendsHe wishes his Beloved were DeadHe wishes for the Cloths of Heaven From In the Seven Woods (1903)In the Seven WoodsThe ArrowThe Folly of being ComfortedNever give all the HeartAdam's CurseRed Hanrahan's Song about IrelandThe Old Men admiring Themselves in the WaterO do not Love Too LongFrom The Green Helmet and Other Poems (1910)His DreamA Woman Homer sungparWordsNo Second TroyReconciliationThe Fascination of What's DifficultA Drinking SongThe Coming of Wisdom with TimeOn hearing that the Students of our New University have joined the Agitation against Immoral LiteratureTo a Poet, who would have me Praise certain Bad Poets, Imitators of His and Mine The MaskUpon a House shaken by the Land AgitationAll things can tempt meBrown PennyFrom Responsibilities (1914)[Introductory Rhymes]To a Wealthy Man who promised a second Subscription to the Dublin Municipal Gallery if it were proved the People wanted PicturesSeptember To a Friend whose Work has come to NothingPaudeenWhen Helen livedOn Those that hated 'The Playboy of the Western World,' The Three BeggarsBeggar to Beggar criedThe WitchThe PeacockTo a Child dancing in the WindTwo Years LaterA Memory of YouthFallen MajestyFriendsThe Cold HeavenThat the Night comeThe MagiThe DollsA Coat[Closing Rhyme]From The Wild Swans at Coole (1917)The Wild Swans at CooleIn Memory of Major Robert GregoryAn Irish Airman foresees his DeathMen improve with the YearsThe Living BeautyA SongThe ScholarsLines written in DejectionOn WomanThe FishermanMemoryThe PeopleBroken DreamsA Deep-sworn VowThe Balloon of the MindOn being asked for a War PoemEgo Dominus TuusThe Double Vision of Michael Robartes From Michael Robartes and the Dancer (1921)Michael Robartes and the DancerEaster, 1916Sixteen Dead MenThe Rose TreeOn a Political PrisonerThe Second ComingA Prayer for my DaughterTo be carved on a Stone at Thoor BallyleedFrom The Tower (1928)Sailing to ByzantiumThe TowerMeditations in Time of Civil WarNineteen Hundred and NineteenA Prayer for my SonFragmentsLeda and the SwanAmong School ChildrenFrom 'Oedipus at Colonus'All Souls' NightFrom The Winding Stair and Other Poems (1933)In Memory of Eva Gore-Booth and Con MarkiewiczA Dialogue of Self and SoulCoole Park,Coole and Ballylee, The ChoiceMohini ChatterjeeByzantiumVacillationCrazy Jane and the BishopCrazy Jane Talks with the BishopHer AnxietyLullabyAfter Long SilenceFather and ChildPartingHer Vision in the WoodA Last ConfessionFrom the 'Antigone'From Parnell's Funeral and Other Poems (1935)Parnell's FuneralA Prayer for Old AgeRibh at the Tomb of Baile and AillinnThe Four Ages of ManMeru From New Poems (1938)The GyresLapis LazuliImitated from the JapaneseAn Acre of GrassWhat Then?Beautiful Lofty ThingsCome Gather Round Me ParnellitesThe Great DayParnellThe SpurThe Municipal Gallery Re-visitedAre You Content From [Last Poems, 1938-39]Under Ben BulbenThe Black TowerCuchulain ComfortedThe StatuesLong-legged FlyHigh TalkMan and the EchoThe Circus Animals' DesertionPolitics Plays[Dates and order follow The Plays (2001)]Cathleen ni Houlihan (1902)On Baile's Strand (1904)Deirdre (1907)At the Hawk's Well (1917) The Words upon the Window-pane (1930) The Resurrection (1931) Purgatory (1938)The Death of Cuchulain (1939)Autobiographical WritingsFrom Reveries Over Childhood and Youth (1916)From The Trembling of the Veil (1922)From Book I: Four Years, 1887-1891From Book II: Ireland After ParnellFrom Book III: Hodos ChameliontosFrom Book IV: The Tragic GenerationFrom Book V: The Stirring of the Bones From Dramatis Personae (1935)From The Bounty of Sweden (1925)From Memoirs (Written 1916-17, Published 1972)From Journal (Written 1909-30, Published 1972)From Pages from a Diary Written in Nineteen Hundred and Thirty (1944)Critical WritingsFrom Ideas of Good and Evil (1903)What is 'Popular Poetry'?From MagicWilliam Blake and the ImaginationThe Symbolism of PoetryIreland and the Arts From Samhain (1903)The Reform of the Theatre From Samhain (1908)First Principles From The Cutting of an Agate (1912) The Tragic Theatre From Per Amica Silentia Lunae (1918)From Anima HominisFrom Anima Mundi From A Vision (1925, 1937)From IntroductionFrom Book I: The Great WheelFrom Part I: The Principal SymbolFrom Part II: Examination of the WheelFrom Part III: The Twenty-eight IncarnationsFrom Book V: Dove or SwanEssays for the Scribner Edition (1937)IntroductionIntroduction to EssaysIntroduction to Plays From On the Boiler (1939)From Preliminaries Prose FictionFrom The Celtic Twilight (1893, 1902) 'Dust Hath Closed Helen's Eye'Regina, Regina Pigmeorum, Veni The Adoration of the Magi (1897)From Stories of Red Hanrahan (1905)Red HanrahanThe Death of Hanrahan AppendixFirst Published Texts of Six Poems NotesA Note on the NotesA Note on the TextNotes to the PoemsNotes to the PlaysNotes to Autobiographical WritingsNotes to Critical WritingsNotes to Prose Fiction