The Green Helmet and Other Poems

by W.B. Yeats

This book was converted from its physical edition to the digital format by a community of volunteers. You may find it for free on the web. Purchase of the Kindle edition includes wireless delivery.

Genres: Poetry, Ireland, Classics, 20th Century, Fiction, Plays, Nobel Prize

100 pages, Kindle Edition

First published January 1, 1910

About the author

William Butler Yeats was an Irish poet and dramatist, and one of the foremost figures of 20th century literature. A pillar of both the Irish and British literary establishments, in his later years Yeats served as an Irish Senator for two terms. He was a driving force behind the Irish Literary Revival, and along with Lady Gregory and Edward Martyn founded the Abbey Theatre, serving as its chief during its early years. In 1923 he was awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature for what the Nobel Committee described as "inspired poetry, which in a highly artistic form gives expression to the spirit of a whole nation." He was the first Irishman so honored. Yeats is generally considered one of the few writers who completed their greatest works after being awarded the Nobel Prize; such works include The Tower (1928) and The Winding Stair and Other Poems (1929).

Yeats was born and educated in Dublin but spent his childhood in County Sligo. He studied poetry in his youth, and from an early age was fascinated by both Irish legends and the occult. Those topics feature in the first phase of his work, which lasted roughly until the turn of the century. His earliest volume of verse was published in 1889, and those slow paced and lyrical poems display debts to Edmund Spenser and Percy Bysshe Shelley, as well as to the Pre-Raphaelite poets. From 1900, Yeats' poetry grew more physical and realistic. He largely renounced the transcendental beliefs of his youth, though he remained preoccupied with physical and spiritual masks, as well as with cyclical theories of life.
--from Wikipedia

Reviews

[Shin Gaku · Rating 4 out of 5]

Simple beauty in this collection is stunning. The depth and philosophy of his later works are absent in these poems, but I still adore them. The mundane aspect in the poems is somewhat warm and charming. I came to understand that Yeats is not an aloof poet but the poet for everybody.

[Kilian Metcalf · Rating 3 out of 5]

I love Yeats, even his minor work lifts my heart. The title poem, a play with a plotline similar to the Green Knight, has the Red Man returning a year after having his head cut off, to collect his penalty, the head of man to be cut off. He had left behind the Green Helmet for the "best of you all to lift." The men in the house quarrel amongst themselves who has the best claim, until Cuchulain throws it into the sea. At the end of the play when the Red Man returns, it is Cuchulain who kneels before him with a joke on his lips:

"Quick to your work, old radish, you will fade with the cocks have crowed."

Instead of cutting of Cuchulain's head, the Red Man (who has been handed the reclaimed Helmet by one of his minions) declares:

"I have not come for your hurt, I'm the Rector of this land,
And with my spitting cat-heads, my frenzied moon-bred band,
Age after age I sift it, and choose for its championship
The man who hits my fancy."

[He places the Helmet on Cuchulain's head.]

"And I choose the laughing lip
That shall not turn from laughing whatever rise or fall,
The heart that grows no bitterer although betrayed by all;
The hand that loves to scatter; the life like a gambler's throw;
And these things I make prosper, till a day come that I know,
When heart and mind shall darken that the weak may end the strong,
And the long remembering harpers have matter for their song."

Wow.

[Greg · Rating 4 out of 5]

In this short collection, we find, "A Drinking Song;"
"Wine comes in at the mouth
And love comes in at the eye;
That's all we shall know for truth
Before we grow old and die.
I lift the glass to my mouth,
I look at you and sigh."
So simple, so beautiful. This isn't a collection of great, five-star poems, but there are some real beauties to be found here. Yeats is becoming my favorite poet.

[Andrew · Rating 4 out of 5]

A short but powerful collection. May have been the first of his collections that really has the depth he becomes known for. Whereas many of the earlier ones that I've read have gorgeous language and metaphor, it is here that I begin to see glimmers of genius subtext. Looking forward to the next one.

[Descending Angel · Rating 3 out of 5]

A collection of 21 poems from 1910. Highlights - "Brown penny" "upon a house shaken by the land agitation" "his dream"

[T.J. Gillespie · Rating 4 out of 5]

Published in 1910 The Green Helmet and Poems is a fair collection of mid-period Yeats. There are a few of the frequently anthologized hits, "No Second Troy" and "The Fascination of What's Difficult," as well as plenty of more obscure and less successful poems. This slim volume does contain the brief and beautiful "A Drinking Song," which I think is Yeats most moving love poem and one you should read right now if you haven't before.

The real surprise here is the verse drama The Green Helmet, which combines Celtic mythology, Irish politics, social criticism, and medieval legend in a tightly plotted folk tale. The play's rhymed dialogue is clear and readable, even more than the poems that precede it. With a plot that echoes Gawain and the Green Knight, Yeats's Irish heroes Laegaire (read as Leary), Conall, and Cuchulain battle each other as they try to outwit a faerie-like, fox-eyed trickster known as the Red Man. While there's plenty of political commentary in the lines ("Here neighbour wars on neighbour and why there is no man knows, / And if a man is lucky all wish his luck away, And take his good name from him between a day and a day."), the language is free of Symbolist influence and the mythological allusions don't overwhelm. This is both an accessible and a satisfying short play.

[Jarrod Sio · Rating 3 out of 5]

“Time out of mind, became too ruinous
To breed the lidless eye that loves the sun?”


“Were not all her life but storm,
Would not painters paint a form”


“Had they but courage equal to desire?”


“With beauty like a tightened bow, a kind
That is not natural in an age like this,”


“The fascination of what’s difficult”


“But where’s the wild dog that has praised his fleas?”


“Because we have made our art of common things,
So bitterly, you’d dream they longed to look
All their lives through into some drift of wings.
You’ve dandled them and fed them from the book”


“And discord follow upon unison,
And all things at one common level lie.
And therefore, friend, if your great race were run
And these things came, so much the more thereby”


“All things can tempt me from this craft of verse:
One time it was a woman’s face, or worse—
The seeming needs of my fool-driven land;
Now nothing but comes readier to the hand
Than this accustomed toil.”


“Wherefore I threw a penny”


“Or if the waves have vexed you and you would find a sport
Of a more Irish fashion, go fight without a rest
A caterwauling phantom a”

[Jaimie · Rating 1 out of 5]

Of Cú Chulainn and the depths of Irish myth this collection is not... Yeats drastically changes tone and theme in this group of poems to tackle the everyday life of the Irish commoner, which does him no favours in my eyes as his strength comes from reimagining Celtic lore and all that makes Ireland a land of romanticism and passion. From a brown penn (no, literally) to a day at the races, Yeats dredges his mind to take himself into a theme that honestly doesn't fit him well at all. The only poems that I felt had any sort of strength (and even then they aren't quite hitting the right notes) are "His Dream" and "No Second Troy," because they touch on themes that are Yeats at his best - dreaming and the ancient world. Yet, even these two attempts seem like they're being held back by overly literal language and juvenile structure. It's almost painfully obvious that Yeats was feeling off his game (and was forced to publish anyways) or his experiment with mundanity did not work out to his advantage.

[Duffy Pratt · Rating 4 out of 5]

It's mediocre Yeats, but even that is pretty great. There's nothing particularly groundbreaking here, and there is less depth of thought than in his later, and some of his earlier, work. But there is a fairly constant lyricism that is beautiful and delightful. The Drinking Song has always been a favorite of mine: simple, sentimental and beautiful:

Wine comes in at the mouth
And love comes in at the eye;
That's all we shall know of truth
Before we grow old and die.
I lift the glass to my mouth,
I look at you, and I sigh.

[Rod · Rating 3 out of 5]

Yes, an odd choice to kick off 2021 (especially as I don't read much poetry and had never really heard of this and can't remember why exactly I picked it up). That said, I quite enjoyed a couple of the poems of thwarted love, found the play ("Green Helmet") delightful in an old folktale kind of way, and now can say I've read (early, I am told) Yeats.

[Victor · Rating 4 out of 5]

52 Books in 52 Weeks #12 A Book you can Read in a Day

[M. Ashraf · Rating 2 out of 5]

The 5th collection of poems in the collected work of Yeats.
I did not like it that much as the other work
But still it was good and rhymes
Next: Responsibilities

[mr. methadone]

Yeats best poetry collection

[nico · Rating 4 out of 5]

“Why, what could she have done, being what she is?
Was there another Troy for her to burn?”

Maybe my favorite collection by far!

[Sarah · Rating 2 out of 5]

Not to my taste

[Sophie · Rating 4 out of 5]

All Things can Tempt me is such a banger actually.

[Jim · Rating 5 out of 5]

This cat could write poetry.

[c · Rating 3 out of 5]

Ranges from pessimism to flat-out bitching.

Still some excellent phrases and images scattered throughout:
"Where wings have memory of wings"

"Where passion and precision have been one
Time out of mind, became too ruinous
To breed the lidless eye that loves the sun?"

[Susie · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is my first time reading any Yeats and I am pleasantly surprised how much I enjoyed it.

The first part is poems and the second part is a play, The Green Helmet, another new experience for me! The play was easy to read and follow so I will be reading more of them.

Definitely a new fan here!

[Cooper Renner · Rating 3 out of 5]

Not one of Yeats' great collections, but still deft and polished in a way that most contemporary formalists can only dream of.

[Neer · Rating 2 out of 5]

Some beautiful images.

More here

http://inkquilletc.blogspot.in/2012/1...

[Brian · Rating 4 out of 5]

Yessss, these are the poems I was waiting for all this time. He finally starts to grow into precision with this collection.

[Sam Fink · Rating 3 out of 5]

A little better than others I read

[Robert · Rating 3 out of 5]

This is a book of poems that Yeats wrote later in life. Lots of thoughts backwards and towards his legacy. I have a hard time with his poems and catching the thought. They read out loud nicely.