The Lake Isle of Innisfree by W.B. Yeats

Let's discuss the poem.

I will arise and go now, and go to Innisfree,

And a small cabin build there, of clay and wattles made;

Nine bean-rows will I have there, a hive for the honey-bee,

And live alone in the bee-loud glade.

And I shall have some peace there, for peace comes dropping slow,

Dropping from the veils of the morning to where the cricket sings;

There midnight’s all a glimmer, and noon a purple glow,

And evening full of the linnet’s wings.

I will arise and go now, for always night and day

I hear lake water lapping with low sounds by the shore;

While I stand on the roadway, or on the pavements grey,

I hear it in the deep heart’s core.

          The Lake Isle is an island in the middle of the lake called Innisfree located in Ireland. The poet in his poem vividly paints the beauty and the serenity of nature through the lake Innisfree. The poet points out the soothing effect of nature on mankind using different techniques in the poem to touch the readers’ hearts.

William Butler Yeats 

See how marvelously he paints the picture of Innisfree and his idea about nature in our minds:

      1.    “I will arise and go now, and go to Innisfree”

       The poem starts with the strong, ardent determination of the poet to go to Innisfree. The leaves readers curious about Innisfree and builds up an interest to keep reading.

      2.   “And a small cabin build there, of clay and wattles made”

      A small cabin made of clay and wattles? Yes, this should be somewhere away from the hustle and bustle of a city; somewhere you find peace, so soft, so serene, so soothing…

      3.   “Nine bean- rows I will have there, a hive for the honey bee”

       Now the poet moves on with giving some more symbols like ‘Nine bean-rows’ and ‘honey bee’. These symbols point out the natural beauty embedded in Innisfree. Using symbols is a very effective technique used by many poets to denote a clearer idea of the poem to the reader. Though the images readers visualize in their mind are slightly different, it always becomes something that’s close to the reader and so the poet succeeds both in moving the poem to the readers’ hearts and denoting his idea. Clever, nah?

     4.   "And live alone in the bee; loud glade”
                                                          An open area without trees

         This line shows the poet’s love towards nature and tranquillity. He wants to be alone, alone with the bees (symbolic to nature), along with their buzz.

     5.    "And I shall have some peace there”

         Here’s the poet promptly says, “I want to escape here for I need some peace”. He gives out the reason for his yearning to return to the mother nature’s lap: to float to that dreamless slumber, listening to her buzzing lullabies to his ears.

     6.   "For peace comes dropping slow”

         
         The word ‘slow’ gradually drops our speed, make us at ease, and we feel the poet’s inner peace.

     7.   "Dropping from the veils of the morning to where the cricket sings”

         The word ‘Veils’ suggests a white, pure, heavenly morning and 'Crickets '(small brown jumping insects) sing (make a loud noise by rubbing its wings together) at night. Putting 6 and 7 together, we find Innisfree, a place with utmost peace from morning till night.

     8.   "There midnight all a glimmer, and noon a purple glow’’

          Here, the poet talks about the beauty of Innisfree in different phases of the day. Glimmering midnight paints a blissful night. Though usually, we don’t experience purple afternoons the poet describes Innisfree’s unique afternoons which glows purple. Purple heathers grow in waters of Innisfree and when the sun shines at noon, the sun rays reflect the water with heathers and glows in purple! Isn’t Innisfree so unique to arise and go? Here, Yeats excels in painting Innisfree’s beauty before us!

     9.   "And evening full of the linnet’s wings”

           Adding to Innisfree’s uniqueness, the poet says Innisfree has evening skies all brown, covered by Linnets’ wings, which are brown. (The evening sky there is full of Linnets flying to their nests in the evening.)

    10.  "While I stand on the roadway, or on the pavements grey’’

           This line gives an idea about where the poet currently lives, quite dull compared to Innisfree. We get this idea when we move to this line with words such as ‘pavements’, ‘grey’, ‘roadway’, from those blissful lines illustrating the beauty of Innisfree. All those underlined words in this phrase are symbols denoting dullness, busyness, stress, industrialization, urbanization etc. with which we have to live. Okay, it’s we humans who built this all, hence it’s definitely us who should be responsible about this. : (

    11.   "I hear it in the deep heart’s core’’

           The long vowel sound here ends the poem with a serious tone almost like a heavy sigh. This tone implies once again the poet’s unfulfilled desire. He’s eager to escape from grey to return to green. 

·         TECHNIQUES

    1.     Symbols

  a)   Small cabin: simple lifestyle

  b)  Nine bean-rows:  freedom and spaciousness (this nine-bean story                                                               comes from the Holy Bible)

  c)   Honeybee: the sweetness of nature

  d)  Cricket: night

  e)   Veil:  Freshness, purity, bliss, white

  f)      Linnet’s wings: brown

  g)  Grey, pavements, roadway: (urbanization, dullness etc. as mentioned above)

     2.    Personification

a)  “Peace comes dropping slow”: Peace is personified here.

     3.       Repetition

a)  ‘’for peace comes dropping slow, dropping from the veils…”:

By repeating the word ‘dropping’ the poet enhances the personification of ‘peace’ making it real.

     4.    Alliteration

a)   ‘’I hear lake water lapping with low sounds by the shore”

The repetition of ‘l’ gives the sound of water lapping, supporting Auditory Imagery (techniques like Auditory Imagery makes the poem more realistic enabling the reader to hear the sound the poet is talking about). This alliteration creates a dreamy effect plus a very relaxing state.

     5.   Simple Language

          This poem is written in simple English. This is also a technique used by the poets to address a larger audience. And also when the theme of the poem intertwines with serenity or something light and funny using simple language can make the poem more moving to the readers.

    6.  Visual Imagery

          Throughout the poem, what we see is a beautiful picture painted by Yeats with symbolic words. How this is done is discussed above.

    7.  Colour combination

      The poet uses several symbols denoting various colours from Innisfree. Innisfree is so alive, changing its hues from pure white in the morning to purple at noon, then to brown in the evening and finally ending the day with a glowing night! And these rich colours strikingly contradict with the monotony of ‘grey‘ which we find in the latter part of the poem.

      This effective use of the colour combination helps the poet to paint a very realistic picture of Innisfree with just a few words.

    ·       SUMMARY

ü This an escapist poetry filled with nostalgia

ü The poem is written in the first-person point of view (The poet uses ‘I’)

üIn the first paragraph, the poet's need to escape to the serenity of Innisfree is highlighted

üIn the second paragraph, he makes the readers tempted to go to Innisfree by
   describing the beauty of Innisfree ( He gives out the reasons as to why he wants to go to Innisfree)

ü  In the third paragraph, his present resident is subtly criticized with the word ‘grey’

ü  The poem starts with a quite ardent tone but ends in a heavy tone (this suggests that the poet is unable to go fulfil his desire; indicates humans caught up in ‘the busy lifestyle’)