Women’s Writing in the British Isles from the Beginnings to the Present
W. B. Yeats
-
Standard Name: Yeats, W. B.
Used Form: William Butler Yeats
Used Form: Willie Yeats
WBY
, who began publishing well before the end of the nineteenth century, is regarded as one of the most important twentieth-century poets in English, and one of the most international of Irish writers. He was early involved in the Irish Literary Revival, and wrote early, highly romantic lyrics on Celtic and fairy themes. Later he made poetry out of the search for a poetic language. Some of his later work is affected by his interest in the occult.
Annie Horniman
, whom FF
met through the Order of the Golden Dawn
, agreed to back the season financially. Farr succeeded in persuading Yeats
to write a one-act play for her season, and enlisted...
Occupation
Florence Farr
FF
retired temporarily from the stage in 1897, disappointed at not having received the same recognition as other New Woman actresses (Elizabeth Robins
, for instance).
Johnson, Josephine. Florence Farr: Bernard Shaw’s new woman. Colin Smythe.
67
She returned a few years later to...
Occupation
Florence Farr
The lecture proved quite popular, and Clifford's Inn had to turn people away. Over the following years, FF
put on many such readings, performing works by Homer
, Shelley
, Yeats
, Lady Gregory
...
Textual Production
Florence Farr
The title-page quotes from W. B. Yeats
's Shadowy Waters.
Literary responses
Florence Farr
Reviews were mixed: some found the plays bizarre, and others (including Yeats
) admired their religious fervour.
Johnson, Josephine. Florence Farr: Bernard Shaw’s new woman. Colin Smythe.
91
They were revived for a charity performance in London in August 1993.
Matthew, Henry Colin Gray et al., editors. Oxford Dictionary of National Biography. http://www.oxforddnb.com/.
Intertextuality and Influence
Florence Farr
Its full title is The Music of Speech, Containing the Words of Some Poets, Thinkers and Music-makers Regarding the Practice of the Bardic Art Together with Fragments of Verse Set to Its Own Melody.
Farr, Florence. The Music of Speech. Elkin Mathews.
title-page
Literary responses
Florence Farr
FF
's performances won the acclaim of several critics, including Yeats
himself, and her recitation technique was for a short time heralded as a new art form: according to William Archer
, in this system...
Writing in 1892, William Butler Yeats
said that Callirrhoë possessed imagination and fancy in plenty
Yeats, W. B. Uncollected Prose by W.B. Yeats. Editors Frayne, John P. and Colton Johnson, Columbia University Press.
227
—setting itself apart from some of MF
's later publications, which he considered to be much less successful.
Literary responses
Michael Field
Writing in The Bookman, William Butler Yeats
called this collection suggestive and thoroughly unsatisfactory.
Yeats, W. B. Uncollected Prose by W.B. Yeats. Editors Frayne, John P. and Colton Johnson, Columbia University Press.
225
He questioned Field's poetic approach. They have poetic feeling and imagination in abundance, he wrote, and yet they have...
Publishing
Michael Field
The second of these was the play which had not only appeared alone in print but had also been staged, in October 1893. A decade after that, in 1903, William Butler Yeats
had turned down...
Anthologization
Michael Field
The Poetry Bookshop
issued A Selection From the Poems of Michael Field in 1923, bringing together pieces from their published poetry collections and plays, such as Underneath the Bough, Callirrhoë; Fair Rosamund, Wild...
Intertextuality and Influence
Jane Gardam
Most of these stories inhabit JG
's familiar territory among suburban women of a certain age, but other protagonists are very different: a dirty old tramp, a reluctant male homosexual, and, in the title story...
During the late 1920s and early 30s, EG
was caught up in the wave of Spiritualism (the belief that the living can contact the dead through mediums) that had been gaining ground in England particularly...