THE WILD SWANS AT COOLE – LINE BY LINE ANALYSIS (WILLIAM BUTLER YEATS)

This post is about the line-by-line analysis of The Wild Swans At Coole written by William Butler Yeats. In this post, you will find out the complete summary of the poem in easy-to-understand language. Moreover, you will find some extra information about the poet and the poem in this post, which you will find helpful. Let us find the line-by-line analysis of The Wild Swans At Coole written by William Butler Yeats.

About The Author

William Butler Yeats was an Irish poet, playwright, and novelist, and one of the most important figures in 20^th-century literature. He was the driving force behind the resurgence of Irish literature, became a pillar of the Irish literary scene, helped establish the Abbey Theater, and served as a second member of the Irish Free State Senator in his later years. Anglo-Irish Protestant Yeats was born in Sandymount, educated in Dublin and London, and raised in Sligo. He was fascinated by Irish legends and occultism, and he learned poetry from an early age. These themes shaped the first phase of his work, from his student days at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in Dublin to the turn of the 20th century. His first collection of poems was published in 1889, and his relaxed poems are credited to Edmund Spenser, Percy Visialie, and Pre-Raphaelite poets.

About The Poem

“The Wild Swans at Coole” is a  by the poet William Butler Yeats (1865–1939). It is written when Yeats was staying with his friend Lady Gregory at his home in Coole Park, this collection was dedicated to his son, Major Robert Gregory (1881-1918). World War I writer Daniel Tobin said Yeats was depressed, reflecting his growing age, the romantic rejection of Maud Gonne and his daughter Insert Gonne, and the ongoing Irish rebellion against Britain. Said he was unhappy. I wrote this. Tobin reflects that this poem is about the poet’s quest to perpetuate beauty in a  world where beauty is deadly and temporarily changing.

Line By Line Analysis

STANZA 1:

The trees are in their autumn beauty,

The woodland paths are dry,

Under the October twilight the water

Mirrors a still sky;

Upon the brimming water among the stones

Are nine-and-fifty swans.

Coole’s Wild Swans begins by describing the beautiful autumn forest with woods. One can imagine the gorgeous colors of the leaves before they fall, and see the twilight reflecting off the water, where fifty-nine swans are swimming. Interestingly, the narrator focuses well on swans and counts all fifty-nine. The sight of the swans so delighted him that he began to count them. But before he could finish his count the birds flew away.

STANZA 2:

The nineteenth autumn has come upon me

Since I first made my count;

I saw before I had well finished,

All suddenly mount

And scatter wheeling in great broken rings

Upon their clamorous wings.

With this stanza of ‘The Wild Swans at Coole,’ the tone shifts to one in all depression remembrance. As he sees the stunning swans today he now no longer sense the identical pleasure as he did withinside the past. Today his thoughts are bothered by the sorrows and sufferings which have come across him. All have modified with him on account that he first heard the bell-like sound in their fluttering wings at twilight nineteen years ago. He felt so glad at that point that he trod his manner homewards with mild and brief steps.

THE WILD SWANS AT COOLE – LINE BY LINE ANALYSIS (WILLIAM BUTLER YEATS)

STANZA 3:

I have looked upon those brilliant creatures,

And now my heart is sore.

All’s changed since I, hearing at twilight,

The first time on this shore,

The bell-beat of their wings above my head,

Trod with a lighter tread.

Here, the speaker turns his mind inward. After looking at the “remarkable creatures” he admits that his “coronary heart is sore”. The purpose for his aching coronary heart is that the whole thing has modified a lot because he first watched the ones swans take flight nineteen years earlier. It seems in ‘The Wild Swans at Coole’ that once he first noticed the swans, they did now no longer make his coronary heart sore. Something has modified through the years so the sight of those swans now brings disappointment to his coronary heart.

Perhaps it’s far due to the fact there appears to be the sort of sharp evaluation among the swans and himself. While he’s tied right down to earth wherein there are numerous cares and worries, they may be unfastened to fly, worry-unfastened into the sky. The sight of the swans brings him lower back to the times while he “trod with a lighter tread”. Perhaps with the identical unwearied pleasure, the swans move on swimming in the water or flying withinside the air in pairs. Their love or their choice to triumph over the coronary heart in their liked remains in them.

STANZA 4:

Unwearied still, lover by lover,

They paddle in the cold

Companionable streams or climb the air;

Their hearts have not grown old;

Passion or conquest, wander where they will,

Attend upon them still.

THE WILD SWANS AT COOLE – LINE BY LINE ANALYSIS (WILLIAM BUTLER YEATS)

In this stanza of ‘The Wild Swans at Coole,’ the speaker contrasts the swans with himself. He has modified so much, and the swans have now no longer modified at all. They are “unwearied nevertheless” and nevertheless paddle after the very equal lover. He says that “their hearts have now no longer grown vintage”. Neither has their ardour faded. They are nevertheless unfastened to “wander in which they will.” Again, he thinks with the technique of wintry weather the swans will go away from this lake and fly to a few different places to construct their nests via way of means of the lake there. They will then pleasure different peoples’ eyes, and the poet will leave out them of their vintage haunts.

STANZA 5:

But now they drift on the still water,

Mysterious, beautiful;

Among what rushes will they build,

By what lake’s edge or pool

Delight men’s eyes when I awake someday

to find they have flown away?

In this stanza of ‘The Wild Swans at Coole,’ the speaker appears to be afraid that at some point, they may virtually depart him and the whole thing could have been modified. He admits that they may be mysterious and exquisite creatures, and he does now no longer recognize what they may do. He doesn’t recognize whether or not or now no longer they may usually on the lake in Coole, or whether or not they may discover another “lake’s facet or pool”. And he doesn’t recognize which men’s eyes they may pride at some point when he wakes up “to discover they have got flown away”.

Since a lot has been modified already inside the speaker’s lifestyles, the swans are an image of balance for they may be usually there and appear by no means to alternate. And yet, the speaker worries that in the future they may take off, by no means to go back to the lake at Coole. At that point, the whole thing will alternate for the speaker.

THE WILD SWANS AT COOLE – LINE BY LINE ANALYSIS (WILLIAM BUTLER YEATS)

It appears the swans are the only component he can rely on as being the equal yr. after yr., and so he fears that in the future, they may depart him. He fears this transformation due to the fact he has already persevered a lot alternate, and the swans had been the only stable, unchanging component in his lifestyle. Even eleven though the swans had been there for a minimum of nineteen years, the speaker nevertheless appears to worry that they may depart. Earlier, he stated that each one had modified besides for the swans at Coole. Perhaps he believes that they, too, will depart him, simply as the whole thing else in his lifestyle has modified. The speaker has simply emerged as acutely aware of his very own mortality.

He is aware of the manner his frame had modified seeing that he first visited the park, and he’s aware of the manner his lifestyle has modified. He has greater issues and cares, and probable greater aches and pains related to vintage age. In short, he’s conscious that his lifestyle has quickly surpassed him, and whilst nature remains equal, the whole thing else in his lifestyle has been modified. He compares himself to the swans on the lake due to the fact they have got now no longer modified at all, and he has modified a lot. This makes the readers additionally aware of their very own mortality.

THE WILD SWANS AT COOLE – LINE BY LINE ANALYSIS (WILLIAM BUTLER YEATS)