Scribd Logo
Upload

Welcome to Scribd!

  • The Lake Isle of Innisfree Essay

    Uploaded by

    yissif
    2K views1 page
    W.B. Yeats's poem "The Lake Isle of Innisfree" explores the speaker's desire to escape the troubles of modern life by living a simple life close to nature on Innisfree. The poem uses an AABB rhyme scheme and figurative language like alliteration and assonance to create musicality. It expresses the theme that nature can provide a restorative refuge from civilization. Yeats writes that living on Innisfree, close to a "bee-loud glade", was a place of authenticity that he could return to emotionally and spiritually through memory. The poem remains popular because many readers relate to the wish to live in nature as an escape from life's anxieties

    Original Description:

    Copyright

    © Attribution Non-Commercial (BY-NC)

    Available Formats

    DOC, PDF, TXT or read online from Scribd

    Did you find this document useful?

    Is this content inappropriate?

    Report this Document
    W.B. Yeats's poem "The Lake Isle of Innisfree" explores the speaker's desire to escape the troubles of modern life by living a simple life close to nature on Innisfree. The poem uses an AABB rhyme scheme and figurative language like alliteration and assonance to create musicality. It expresses the theme that nature can provide a restorative refuge from civilization. Yeats writes that living on Innisfree, close to a "bee-loud glade", was a place of authenticity that he could return to emotionally and spiritually through memory. The poem remains popular because many readers relate to the wish to live in nature as an escape from life's anxieties

    Copyright:

    Attribution Non-Commercial (BY-NC)
    Download as DOC, PDF, TXT or read online from Scribd
    Flag for inappropriate content
    Download as doc, pdf, or txt
    2K views1 page

    The Lake Isle of Innisfree Essay

    Uploaded by

    yissif
    W.B. Yeats's poem "The Lake Isle of Innisfree" explores the speaker's desire to escape the troubles of modern life by living a simple life close to nature on Innisfree. The poem uses an AABB rhyme scheme and figurative language like alliteration and assonance to create musicality. It expresses the theme that nature can provide a restorative refuge from civilization. Yeats writes that living on Innisfree, close to a "bee-loud glade", was a place of authenticity that he could return to emotionally and spiritually through memory. The poem remains popular because many readers relate to the wish to live in nature as an escape from life's anxieties

    Copyright:

    Attribution Non-Commercial (BY-NC)
    Download as DOC, PDF, TXT or read online from Scribd
    Flag for inappropriate content
    Download as doc, pdf, or txt
    of 1

    The Lake Isle of Innisfree, which was first published in 1893, is an example of W.

    B
    Yeats’s earlier lyric poems which explores his desire for the peace and tranquillity of his
    boyhood haunt, Innisfree. Through out the three short quatrains, the poem implies that a life
    of simplicity in nature will bring peace to the troubled speaker. However, it is the speaker’s
    recollection of Innisfree, and therefore the journey is an emotional and spiritual escape rather
    than an actual one. Emotionally, the speaker can return again and again to the tranquility of
    Innisfree. Therefore, to keep the musicality of the poem and express the poet’s relationship to
    the past, Yeats applies several poetry characteristics such as: the use of the style, themes, and
    figurative language.

    As an introductory characteristic, “The Lake Isle of Innisfree” utilizes end rhyme in an


    “abab” rhyme scheme. This means that the end of the first line of a stanza rhymes with the
    end of the third line, and the end of the second line of a stanza rhymes with the end of the
    fourth line. All three of the quatrains in the poem display an “abab” rhyme scheme. Besides,
    the non-respecting of grammar roles and the anarchy of words is to maintain the musicality of
    the text. Also prevalent is the use of alliteration and assonance, both of which emphasize the
    musical tone and rhythm of the piece. Hence, the reader is supposed to sense a refrain
    developing in the style.

    In still another trait, by reading and rereading the poem, it comes to our minds that
    Yeats, in “The Lake Isle of Innisfree”, expresses the theme of nature that presents an
    essentially restorative place to which human beings can go to flee the chaos and corrupting
    influence of civilization. He also shows his nostalgic urge to return to a simpler, more familiar
    life kind of homesickness which expressed itself as a desire to “return” to “Innisfree”. In brief,
    Yeats emphasizes the authenticity of the desire to live close to nature, writing that he hears the
    call to go to Innisfree “in the heart’s deep core”.

    Yeats has paid attention to the use of figurative language as another feature of poetry.
    He therefore specifies the language used in the poem when he says in line 2 that he will not
    only build a “cabin”, but it also will be made of “clay and wattles”. Notice also the
    particularly interesting image of the “bee-loud glade” which invests Innisfree with a magical
    air. We can also notice in the 1st line “I will arise…Innisfree” that the assonance is less clear
    than either rhyme or alliteration, but its use is similar; it links important words or phrases in
    the poem together as well as emphasizes the sound and mood of it. Indeed, assonance occurs
    when the vowel sounds attached to different consonants are repeated in the poem such as: “I
    hear lake…by the shore”. In short, via figurative language, the poet explains his belonging to
    nature “Innisfree” as the supreme way to break away from the distractions of modern life.

    All in all, “The Lake Isle of Innisfree” remains one of Yeats’s most popular poems
    because of this very fact: readers vicariously participate in Yeat’s fantasy because it is such a
    popular and generic one. Although not everyone necessarily desires to live alone in a small
    cabin, the wish to live close to nature and away from the anxiety of present life is common, as
    is the wish to see one’s own self in the best possible light. Compared to Yeats’s later more
    modern poetry, the poem is sentimental and conventional, but these facts have also helped its
    popularity, as those very features make “The Lake Isle of Innisfree” accessible to more
    readers, meeting their expectations of what poetry should do.

    You might also like