Quotessence
Home / Authors / William Butler Yeats
William Butler Yeats

William Butler Yeats Quotes

Poet

Filter quotes by topic

AllMenHeartWorldLifeIfsEyeDreamKnowsMayMindSoulThinkingMadeLoveHandsLongPoetryWindArtBody

Famous William Butler Yeats Quotes

“Had there been no Renaissance and no Italian influence to bring in the stories of other lands English history would, it may be, have become as important to the English imagination as the Greek Myths to the Greek imagination; and many plays by many poets would have woven it into a single story whose contours, vast as those of Greek myth, would have made living men and women seem like swallows building their nests under the architrave of some Temple of the Giants.”

MenMayMadeImportantPlayStoriesSeemsImaginationInfluenceLandBuildingPoetMen And WomenMythGreekGiantsTemplesItalianNestsRenaissanceWovenEnglish HistoryGreek Myth
Book:The Collected Works of W.B. Yeats Volume IV: Early Essays
Create image

“Bodies of holy men and women exude Miraculous oil, odour of violet. But under heavy loads of trampled clay Lie bodies of the vampires full of blood; Their shrouds are bloody and their lips are wet.”

MenBodyTruthLyingViolenceBloodHolyMen And WomenLipsHeavyOilVampireWetLoadBloodyVioletClayMiraculousShroudsHoly ManHeavy Loads
Book:The Collected Works of W.B. Yeats Volume I: The Poems: Revised Second Edition
Create image

“Surely among a rich man's flowering lawns, Amid the rustle of his planted hills, Life overflows without ambitious pains; And rains down life until the basin spills, And mounts more dizzy high the more it rains As though to choose whatever shape it wills.”

MenLifePainRichShapesRainRichesHillsAmbitiousLawnsSpillsRich ManFloweringOverflowDizzy
Book:The Collected Works of W. B. Yeats: Volume I: The Poems, 2nd Edition
Create image

“You ask what I have found and far and wide I go, Nothing but Cromwell's house and Cromwell's murderous crew, The lovers and the dancers are beaten into the clay, And the tall men and the swordsmen and the horsemen where are they?”

MenAsksFoundHouseLoversWideOppressionDancerTallCrewBeatenClayHorsemenCromwellSwordsman
Book:The Collected Works of W. B. Yeats: Volume I: The Poems, 2nd Edition
Create image