In Memory of W.B. Yeats by W.H. Auden: Summary, Analysis, Themes
In Memory of W. B. Yeats was first published in New Republic in 1939. The poem was written by W. H. Auden to mourn the death of W. B. Yeats, the great Irish poet and a contemporary of Auden, in January 1939. The poem is divided into three sections, each forming a separate poetic unit. The relationship among these units is not very close and organic, as each section is based on somewhat independent strains of thought. This poem is one of the best in a set of poems grouped together as "Occasional Poem" in Auden's 1940 volume, Another Time . Yeats died in France early in 1939, at the age of seventy-four. Throughout the 1930s, he was recognized by poets often associated with Auden's group as the greatest poet in English literature of his time. Poets like C. Day Lewis imitated his style extensively; Auden himself modeled September 1, 1939 on Yeats' Easter, 1916 . MacNeice wrote a critical study of Yeats, and Spender was greatly influenced by him. Yeats had published thes…