Corpus of Electronic Texts Edition
Background details and bibliographic information
Demon and Beast
Author: William Butler Yeats
File Description
Electronic edition compiled and proof-read by Beatrix Färber
Funded by School of History, University College, Cork
1. First draft.
Extent of text:
916 words
Publication
CELT: Corpus of Electronic Texts: a project of University College, Cork
College Road, Cork, Irelandhttp://www.ucc.ie/celt (2014) Distributed by CELT online at University College, Cork, Ireland.
Text ID Number: E910001-064
Availability [RESTRICTED]
The works by W. B. Yeats are in the public domain. This electronic text is available with prior consent of the CELT programme for purposes of private or academic research and teaching.
Notes
Written on 23 November 1918; first published in the Dial in November 1920 (A. Norman Jeffares, p. 235).
Sources
Literature (a small selection)- W. B. Yeats, The Autobiography of William Butler Yeats, consisting of Reveries over childhood and youth, The trembling of the veil, and Dramatis personae (New York 1938).
- Richard Ellmann, Yeats: The Man and the Masks. Corrected edition with a new preface (Oxford 1979). [First published New York 1948; reprinted London 1961.]
- Peter Ure, 'Yeats's 'Demon and Beast', Irish Writing 31 (Summer 1955) 4250.
- Peter Allt and Russell K. Alspach, The Variorum Edition of the Poems of W.B. Yeats (New York: Macmillan 1957).
- W. B. Yeats, Essays and Introductions (New York: Macmillan 1961).
- W. B. Yeats, Explorations: selected by Mrs W. B. Yeats (London/New York: Macmillan 1962).
- Richard Ellmann, The Identity of Yeats (New York 1964).
- Paul Cohen, 'Yeats as Portraitist', Canadian Journal of Irish Studies, 5/2 (Decmber 1979), 3137.
- A. Norman Jeffares, A New Commentary on the Poems of W.B. Yeats (Stanford 1984).
- Seamus Deane, ''The Second Coming': Coming Second; Coming in a Second', Irish University Review, 22/1 (Spring/Summer 1992) 92100.
- A general bibliography is available online at the official web site of the Nobel Prize. See: http://nobelprize.org/nobel_prizes/literature/laureates/1923/yeats-bibl.html
The edition used in the digital edition- William Butler Yeats Demon and Beast in , Ed. Richard J. Finneran The Collected Poems of W. B. Yeats. Macmillan Press, London, (1991) pages 188189
Encoding
Project Description
CELT: Corpus of Electronic Texts
Sampling Declaration
The whole poem.
Editorial Declaration
Correction
The text has been proof-read twice.
Normalization
The electronic text represents the edited text.
Hyphenation
The editorial practice of the hard-copy editor has been retained.
Segmentation
div0= the individual poem, stanzas are marked lg.
Interpretation
Names of persons (given names), and places are not tagged. Terms for cultural and social roles are not tagged.
Profile Description
Created:
(23 November 1918)
Use of language
Language: [EN] The poem is in English.
Revision History
Corpus of Electronic Texts Edition: E910001-064
Demon and Beast: Author: William Butler Yeats
p.188
- For certain minutes at the least
That crafty demon and that loud beast
That plague me day and night
Ran out of my sight;
Though I had long perned in the gyre,
Between my hatred and desire.
I saw my freedom won
And all laugh in the sun.
- The glittering eyes in a death's head
Of old Luke Wadding's portrait said
Welcome, and the Ormondes all
Nodded upon the wall,
And even Strafford smiled as though
It made him happier to know
I understood his plan.
Now that the loud beast ran
There was no portrait in the Gallery
But beckoned to sweet company,
For all men's thoughts grew clear
Being dear as mine are dear.
- But soon a tear-drop started up,
For aimless joy had made me stop
Beside the little lake
To watch a white gull take
A bit of bread thrown up into the air;
Now gyring down and perning there
He splashed where an absurd
Portly green-pated bird
Shook off the water from his back;
Being no more demoniac
A stupid happy creature
Could rouse my whole nature.
p.189
- Yet I am certain as can be
That every natural victory
Belongs to beast or demon,
That never yet had freeman
Right mastery of natural things,
And that mere growing old, that brings
Chilled blood, this sweetness brought;
Yet have no dearer thought
Than that I may find out a way
To make it linger half a day.
- O what a sweetness strayed
Through barren Thebaid,
Or by the Mareotic sea
When that exultant Anthony
And twice a thousand more
Starved upon the shore
And withered to a bag of bones!
What had the Caesars but their thrones?