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William Butler YeatsA modern alternative to SparkNotes and CliffsNotes, SuperSummary offers high-quality Study Guides with detailed chapter summaries and analysis of major themes, characters, and more.
The concept of the “gyre” (Line 19) appears in the final stanza of “Sailing to Byzantium” as a reference to Yeats’s complex idea of cyclicality. This kind of cyclicality is four-dimensional, like a pair of cones twisting their way around each other. Unable to rely on this image as an adequate explanation, he explicitly lays out his philosophy in his book on poetics and mysticism, A Vision (1925). The timeline of humanity, he argues, is a “Great Wheel” consisting of 28 points—one for each part of the lunar cycle—surrounding the circle like numbers on a clock. Rather than two hands, the wheel has four, each representing polar concepts such as Mask and Body (secularity) and Will and Creative Mind (religiosity). Together the 28 spokes form an entire cycle as the elements coalesce in different combinations. A full cycle symbolizes existence in two ways: On the microcosmic level, it is the life, death, and rebirth of an individual, while on a macrocosmic level it accounts for 2000 years of human history, which periodically shifts from epochs of terror into ones of beauty.
From Yeats’s vantage, the wheel’s halfway point is a fleeting moment of historical splendor. Between the reign of the ancient Greeks in 500 BC and the Italian Renaissance in 1500 AD was the glory of Byzantium, which began in 500 AD.
By William Butler Yeats
Among School Children
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A Prayer for My Daughter
A Prayer for My Daughter
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A Vision
A Vision: An Explanation of Life Founded upon the Writings of Giraldus and upon Certain Doctrines Attributed to Kusta Ben Luka
William Butler Yeats
Cathleen Ni Houlihan
Cathleen Ni Houlihan
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Crazy Jane Talks with the Bishop
Crazy Jane Talks with the Bishop
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Death
Death
William Butler Yeats
Easter, 1916
Easter, 1916
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Leda and the Swan
Leda and the Swan
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No Second Troy
No Second Troy
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The Lake Isle of Innisfree
The Lake Isle of Innisfree
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The Second Coming
The Second Coming
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The Wild Swans at Coole
The Wild Swans at Coole
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When You Are Old
When You Are Old
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