Byzantium

The unpurged images of day recede;

The Emperor's drunken soldiery are abed;
Night resonance recedes, night-walkers' song
After great cathedral gong;
A starlit or a moonlit dome disdains
All that man is,
All mere complexities,
The fury and the mire of human veins.

Before me floats an image, man or shade,

Shade more than man, more image than a shade;
For Hades' bobbin bound in mummy-cloth
May unwind the winding path;
A mouth that has no moisture and no breath
Breathless mouths may summon;
I hail the superhuman;
I call it death-in-life and life-in-death.

Miracle, bird or golden handiwork,

More miracle than bird or handiwork,
Planted on the starlit golden bough,
Can like the cocks of Hades crow,
Or, by the moon embittered, scorn aloud
In glory of changeless metal
Common bird or petal
And all complexities of mire or blood.

At midnight on the Emperor's pavement flit

Flames that no faggot feeds, nor steel has lit,
Nor storm disturbs, flames begotten of flame,
Where blood-begotten spirits come
And all complexities of fury leave,
Dying into a dance,
An agony of trance,
An agony of flame that cannot singe a sleeve.

Astraddle on the dolphin's mire and blood,

Spirit after spirit! The smithies break the flood,
The golden smithies of the Emperor!
Marbles of the dancing floor
Break bitter furies of complexity,
Those images that yet
Fresh images beget,
That dolphin-torn, that gong-tormented sea.

Analysis of Byzantium
Stanza One

The unpurged images of day recede;

The Emperor’s drunken soldiery are abed;
Night resonance recedes, night-walkers’ song
After great cathedral gong;
A starlit or a moonlit dome disdains
All that man is,
All mere complexities,
The fury and the mire of human veins.
The first stanza of ‘Byzantium’ presents the night view of the place. As night emerges, the unpurged images or the human
activity recedes. Also, the drunken soldiers of the emperor have gone to sleep. By the time the sound of the gong of the
great Cathedral (the church of St. Sophia, the center of Byzantine) is heard, even the sounds of the night and the songs of
the nightwalkers (prostitutes) fades. All these scenes indicate that it is the late hours of the night, he is describing. The
“drunken soldiers” and “night-walkers” indicate the poet’s disappointment over the degrading cultural and social values
that addressed in most of his poems. Further, the second part of the stanza comments on the insignificant life of the
human. The moonlit or starlit dome of the cathedral, suggest that human life is filled with “complexities” caused mainly by
the “mire of human veins”.
 
Stanza Two

Before me floats an image, man or shade,

Shade more than man, more image than a shade;
For Hades’ bobbin bound in mummy-cloth
May unwind the winding path;
A mouth that has no moisture and no breath
Breathless mouths may summon;
I hail the superhuman;
I call it death-in-life and life-in-death.

In the second stanza of the ‘Byzantium’, the poet talks of the vision or the image that appeared in front of him.  He
wonders if it is a man or a shade. As he looks further, he realizes it to be a shade more than a man; an image more than a
shade. The verb “float“ makes it clear that the image isn`t moving but simply carried away by the wind, confirming it to be
a ghost or spirit. For, Hade’s bobbin – the dead people wound in “mummy-cloth” – takes the winding path to reach him.
Further, the next lines describe them to be with no “moisture” or “breath” and “dry-mouthed”.
Yeats has used the “mummy-cloth” as a symbol of human experiences and periods of aging and death. The cloth wound
around indicates the complexities of life a soul carries around after death to be unwounded before entering the afterlife. A
similar idea is presented by the poet in his other poem ‘All Soul’s Night’ published in 1920. The poet addresses those dead
people as “superhuman” for they are free from the earthly curbs. Further, the poet employed “chiasmus,” a rhetorical
device to reveal the contrasting perspective on death. For those alive on earth may think it to be an end of life, but from a
spiritual perspective, it is the beginning of new life. The use of “me” in this stanza gives more personal and subjectivity to
the poem.
 
Stanza Three

Miracle, bird or golden handiwork,

More miracle than bird or handiwork,
Planted on the starlit golden bough,
Can like the cocks of Hades crow,
Or, by the moon embittered, scorn aloud
In glory of changeless metal
Common bird or petal
And all complexities of mire or blood.

In the third stanza of ‘Byzantium,’ the poet sees something that looks like a miracle. He sees a golden bird or bird sculpture
placed on the starlit golden bow. The poet here refers to the art and architectural beauty Byzantine is famous for. He calls
it a miracle for it was more than a bird or a handiwork. It seems to be crowing like the cocks of Hades, the city of the dead,
and ghosts. In its glory of “changeless metal”, the state of immortality, it scorns those “birds of petals”, the mortal ones.
The bird image serves as a paradox on the immortality gained by human handiwork. It becomes something that is immune
to the impurities and aging of human experience. The art, which is manmade, becomes something that gives reason to
human existence.
 
Stanza Four
At midnight on the Emperor’s pavement flit
Flames that no faggot feeds, nor steel has lit,
Nor storm disturbs, flames begotten of flame,
Where blood-begotten spirits come
And all complexities of fury leave,
Dying into a dance,
An agony of trance,
An agony of flame that cannot singe a sleeve.
The fourth stanza of the poem details what the poet has witnessed in the city at midnight. At midnight on the Emperor’s
pavement, a fire appears. It is neither fed by fuel sticks nor started by striking a piece of iron against a flintstone. They look
like self-generated flames, one arising out of another. It is miraculous in nature for even storms can not quench them. The
blood-begotten spirits (according to medieval belief spirits are begotten of blood) come to be removed of all their
impurities and earthly passions. “Blood-begotten” spirits can also be interpreted as the spirits of those who died during the
world war and the civil war in Ireland. The spirits undergo a “dance” of “trance” in this mystical agonizing fire, yet can burn
even the sleeve. It allegorically refers to the fire of Judgment mentioned in the bible to those impure souls.
 
Stanza Five

Astraddle on the dolphin’s mire and blood,

Spirit after spirit! The smithies break the flood,
The golden smithies of the Emperor!
Marbles of the dancing floor
Break bitter furies of complexity,
Those images that yet
Fresh images beget,
That dolphin-torn, that gong-tormented sea.

The fifth and the final stanza of the poem ‘Byzantium’, deliberate on the final process of the spirits.  Spirit after Spirit comes
to ride on the dolphins, symbolically referring to the Roman beliefs of the dead carried to the Isles of the Blessed. The
golden blacksmiths of the emperor are given the responsibility of keeping things in order. At the same time, the marbles of
the dancing floor break even the little furies of complexity for those images that beget fresh images in fire. Still, the process
of the spirits being carried on despite the sea being torn by the dolphins and the silence of the night disturbed with the
gong sound.

Sailing To Byzantium

Analysis of Sailing to Byzantium

Stanza One
Lines 1–2
That is no country for old men. The young
In one another’s arms, birds in the trees,

In the first stanza, the poet says that he is sailing to Byzantium from Ireland because the country is not suitable for old
people to live there. Old men are shut out from that kind of life that is available here because life there is all physical and
sensual. From this life, he is sailing to the city of Byzantium where intellectual life is awaiting him.

The poem begins with a declarative sentence in the first line, “That is no country for old men.” Straightaway, the reader
senses the importance of Yeats’s diction, for instead of using “this” to mean the country the speaker is currently in, the
speaker instead says “that,” which gives the reader the sense that the speaker is looking at his former country from a
distance. Perhaps he has already started his journey to Byzantium as the poem opens.

That is no country for old men. They will not find that country suitable for them to live in. “That Country” means Ireland
where the old poet is living at present, from where he sails to Byzantium. The country he has left for sailing to Byzantium is
described in the remaining lines of the first stanza. In the lines, “The young… and dies” the poet has described Ireland, the
country of physical and sensual life.

The rest of the stanza is the speaker’s explanation as to why his former country is not a welcoming place for those who are
older. In the second line, Yeats writes, “The young/ In one another’s arms, birds in the trees.” The speaker’s former home
sounds idyllic. As the young lovers are wrapped in each other’s arms, and the birds are singing in the trees. It means in the
country, young people enjoy the pleasures of love.
Lines 3–4
—Those dying generations—at their song,
The salmon-falls, the mackerel-crowded seas,

Here, the speaker seems to be commenting on the creatures who inhabit his former land. Instead of concentrating on the
things that will last forever, they instead only enjoy what is right in front of them at any given moment.
The natural imagery of the previous lines continues as the speaker details all of the beautiful creatures that are in his
former home. Here, the speaker bitterly tells that all of these creatures will one day grow old, as well. Birds, fish, and all
other creatures lead an animal, physical life which is spent in procreation. All kinds of creatures are born, they indulge in
sex, and they procreate and in due course die. They do not lead intellectual and artistic existence. Therefore, all the
creatures of that Country lead animalistic, physical life spent in procreation. All kinds of creatures there are born, procreate
and then die.

Lines 5–8
Fish, flesh, or fowl, commend all summer long
Whatever is begotten, born, and dies.
Caught in that sensual music all neglect
Monuments of unageing intellect.

The waterfalls of “That country” are crowded with salmon fish. Besides, the seas there are teeming with mackerel fish. All
these creatures (birds and fish) listen to sensual music and do not indulge in intellectual or artistic activity.

In lines 7 to 8, the poet says these creatures listen to sensual music without caring for intellectual activity, which
(intellectual activity) is ageless and so of a permanent value. Great works of art never die. Sensual music is that which
appeals to the senses as distinguished from the mind or the intellect. The intellectual achievements are supposed to be
ageless and immortal and so of permanent value. The reference is to things of beauty which are a joy forever, an allusion
to ‘Endymion’ by John Keats.

Stanza Two
Lines 1–2
An aged man is but a paltry thing,
A tattered coat upon a stick, unless

The second stanza is more of the same. Readers cannot dismiss the bitter tone that is present in this stanza; Yeats’s diction
is particularly telling, comparing an old man to an insignificant, small thing. He infers that there is nothing left to an old
man: he is simply a stick wearing a worn and torn jacket. Yeats seems to be commenting here, however, that just because
one is old, it does not mean he has an old soul, for the soul of the old man is clapping and singing loudly.

Apart from that, the second stanza can be interpreted differently. Here, the poet, as an old man, is sailing to Byzantium
from Ireland. In the first stanza, he has described the country from which he is sailing away. While, in the second stanza,
the poet portrays the benefits of the country of his arrival for an old man like him.

The poet begins by saying that an aged man is worthless. With a tattered coat upon his weak and thin body, the old man
looks like a scare-crow. In the first line of this stanza, when the poet says, “An aged man is but a paltry thing,” he means
that an aged (old) person is paltry (an insignificant thing), while in line 10 of the poem, when he says, “A tattered coat upon
a stick,” he makes use of a metaphor, which presents old age as an old worn-out coat hung up on a bamboo pole or stick.

Lines 3–4
Soul clap its hands and sing, and louder sing
For every tatter in its mortal dress,
In lines 3 to 4, when he says, “Unless/ Soul clap its hands and sing,” he means to say that unless the soul feels thrilled, claps
its hands and sings a happy song, that is, a state of spiritual exaltation. By “and louder sing/ For every tatter in its mortal
dress,” he means that the more worn out his bodily dress, the louder the soul sings.

Here, the speaker informs the reader that the more tattered in dress one is, the louder he should sing because certainly,
the aged have earned their song. Besides, a man merely old is worse off than youth; something positive must be added. If
the soul can wax and grow strong as the body wanes with advancing years, then every step in the dissolution of the body
(“every tatter in its mortal dress”) is cause for a further increase in joy. But this can happen only if the soul can rejoice in its
power and magnificence.

Lines 5–8
Nor is there singing school but studying
Monuments of its own magnificence;
And therefore I have sailed the seas and come
To the holy city of Byzantium.

In this section, he says that the best music for the soul of an old man is the study and appreciation of the grand
monuments of immortal intellect. An aged man acquires some merit or value only if old age is accompanied by a spiritual
recognition by admiring the great works of art.

The soul of the old man must be strong to seek that which is neglected by youth. To do so, the older man must sail to
Byzantium, which the poet describes as the holy city of Byzantium. Byzantium is the symbol of the ideal, aesthetic, and
transformed existence, and suggests a far-off, unfamiliar civilization where art is for its own sake and whose religion is in an
exotic form.

Moreover, the couplet in the second stanza clearly announces that the speaker has left his home to visit the “holy city of
Byzantium.” Throughout its history, Byzantium, later Constantinople and then Istanbul, has been known as a center for the
arts and intellectualism. The speaker feels he will be much more appreciated in such an area.

Stanza Three
Lines 1–2
O sages standing in God’s holy fire
As in the gold mosaic of a wall,

The third stanza represents a shift to the most ethereal and metaphysical. Once the speaker arrives in Byzantium, he
addresses the sages or wise people, he finds there. In the first two lines of the third stanza, the poet now appeals to the
sages who stand in “God’s holy fire” and who have thus been purged of the last remnants of sensuality. These sages look
like the figures represented in “the gold mosaic of a wall.”

In line 1 of this stanza, when the poet says “O sages”, he addresses the saints. By “standing in God’s holy fire,” the poet
refers to the figures of sages (saints) standing in the holy fire of God to purge themselves by this performance of penance.
In line 2, by “As in the gold mosaic of a wall,” the poet means the figures that were represented in the gold mosaic in
Apollinare in Ravenna, Italy. The word ‘mosaic’ means the artistic pattern that is formed by placing together precious
stones of various colors.

Lines 3–4
Come from the holy fire, perne in a gyre,
And be the singing-masters of my soul.

In line 3, coming out of the holy fire shown in the mosaic is the “pern in a gyre”, which means a column of smoke in a
circular motion. The poet wants them to come out of the “holy fire” and to descend upon him with a hawk-like movement.
He wants them to become the “singing masters of his soul,” and to purify his heart. In other words, to teach him to listen
to his spiritual music as distinguished from the sensual music (which the poet has mentioned earlier in stanza one).

The speaker seems to almost be conjuring these people to him in an attempt to become the “singing-masters” of his soul.
Yeats’s use of assonance with the long “I” sounds in “fire” and “gyre” lend an almost sing-song, mystical quality to the
speaker’s conjuring. One can almost picture the speaker calling forth the spirits in Byzantium, pleading with them to inspire
and awaken his soul.

Lines 5–8
Consume my heart away; sick with desire
And fastened to a dying animal
It knows not what it is; and gather me
Into the artifice of eternity.

The last half of the third stanza continues this thought. By “And fastened to a dying animal,” he means that his heart is tied
to a dying body and does not know or comprehend its reality. By “sick with desire,” he means that his heart is sick as it is
full of the dross of earthly desires. The speaker admits here that he feels lost and “sick with desire.” The ostracizing he
experienced in his former home has sickened his heart, and he is begging the wise sages to cleanse him. He begs for
immortality, longing to live and be appreciated forever.

Moreover, the poet has yet not been able to get rid of his sensual desires which still cling to him. He, an aged man on the
verge of death, is unable to understand his reality. Only those sages can purge his heart of all impurity, and give him the
permanence that great objects of art possess.

Stanza Four
Lines 1–4
Once out of nature I shall never take
My bodily form from any natural thing,
But such a form as Grecian goldsmiths make
Of hammered gold and gold enamelling

In stanza four, the speaker makes his pronouncement: he wants to forego his body and live forever, immortalized the way
the Greeks would have intended: through their art. Here, the poet presents his dislike for the physical and sensual life in
Ireland; in the second stanza, he talks about what of spiritual life the poet would lead in the golden city of Byzantium, and
the third stanza is addressed to the sages of Byzantium to make his soul purged of all remaining sensuality. But in this last
stanza of the poem, the poet says what kind of form he would like to be born in his re-birth.

Once he has renounced his early body, he would not like to be reborn in the same or any other earthly shape. He will reject
all physical incarnations because all living beings are subject to mortality and death. Therefore, the speaker announces that
he would like to take his form in Grecian urns or enameling, handcrafted by goldsmiths, so that an emperor could spend his
nights admiring him in the artwork. The past, present, and future, will all be one because the speaker will live for eternity.

Lines 5–8
To keep a drowsy Emperor awake;
Or set upon a golden bough to sing
To lords and ladies of Byzantium
Of what is past, or passing, or to come.

He would like to be in the shape of a golden bird, the kind of bird which Grecian goldsmiths are believed to have designed
for the pleasure of an emperor. As a golden bird, a work of art, he would be beyond decay or death and would therefore
be unlike the “dying generations” of real birds mentioned in the first stanza.
As a golden bird, he will be placed on a golden bough and will appear to be singing songs of all times, the past, the present,
and the future, to an audience of the lords and ladies of Byzantium. In the shape of a singing golden bird, his song will be
that of spiritual ecstasy which will be shown by the soul “clapping its hands and singing.” Moreover, he will be surrounded,
not by young lovers and other animal creatures of the sexual cycle but by an audience that would be elegant and abstract.
In Byzantium, he will have no age, past, present, or future.

Historical Context
‘Sailing to Byzantium’ by W.B. Yeats was composed probably in 1927, and published in Yeats’ collection of poems titled
“The Tower” in 1928. This poem fits in nicely with the literary movement in which it was written, Modernism. Modernists
often rebelled against tradition and celebrated self-discovery, which this poem does. It is also interesting to consider when
Yeats wrote this poem. He wrote it fewer than ten years before his death, which means he was an old man. This is
important since the speaker in this poem feels he is not appreciated in his homeland due to his advanced age. Perhaps
Yeats was feeling alienated from his society for the same reasons.

About W.B. Yeats

William Butler Yeats, a proud Irishman, is known for such works as ‘When You Are Old’ and ‘The Second Coming’. Yeats was
strongly influenced by his native country, and much of his poetry is a reflection of that influence. Born on June 13, 1865, at
Sandymount near Dublin in Ireland, Yeats published prose called “A Vision” wherein he sought to furnish a comprehensive
philosophy of history. He perceived history as recurring cycles of similar epochs, each of five hundred years duration. While
he had a keen interest in poetry, he too wrote a few plays, which had fanatic and incoherent plots. However, the play-
writing could not interest him for long, therefore, later in his life, he started exploring theosophy, Platonism,
Neoplatonism, and Rosicrucianism. Yeats died in 1939, but his legacy lives on even today.

Sailing to Byzantium” Themes

Old Age and Mortality
The poem is, at least in part, about the difficulties of old age. To the speaker, the inevitable failure of the aging body
presents a choice: the elderly can either fade into husks of their former selves, or learn to escape the physical limitations of
old age by beautifying their souls—and, eventually, upon dying, becoming something that isn’t tied to the human body at
all. The poem thus implies a separation between the body and soul, and presents old age as both a burden and an
opportunity for a kind of spiritual transcendence—a chance to leave the earthly world, and all its limitations, behind.
In the first stanza, the speaker vividly evokes the beautiful world of the young. The world is described through images of
natural fertility and bounty: young people embracing, singing birds, vast schools of fish. This world is intensely focused on
material pleasures and the creation of even more new life.
But, as the speaker hints when he calls the singing birds “those dying generations” and observes that the happy young
“neglect / Monuments of unageing intellect,” this world is also limited by its inability to accept the realities of aging. That
is, the young are so self-absorbed, so wrapped up in these physical, bodily delights, that they can't yet appreciate their own
mortality, and certainly can't achieve the kind of spiritual transcendence the speaker longs for.
Indeed, an old man with a failing body can’t even pretend to fit in there. The poem's very first line, “That is no country for
old men,” lets readers know that the speaker is totally at odds with this world. Even the word “that” separates the speaker
from the country: it’s something over there, something he doesn’t belong to.
The speaker then focuses on the failures of his aging body, which he describes as “a tattered coat”: not the substance of his
real self, but just a garment he’s wearing. The only way to salvage such a garment, in turn, is for the soul to “clap its hands
and sing.” The soul itself thus seems to have a body—but a different kind of body, one that can’t fade and weaken over
time.
Because there is no “singing school,” however, no one to teach the speaker's soul how to achieve such vibrancy, the
speaker makes an imagined spiritual journey to the long-lost holy city of Byzantium. He's making this journey with his mind,
not his body; he envisions leaving the body behind forever, in fact, and the power of his imagination helps him to move
beyond his physical frailty. This again emphasizes the separation between the speaker's mortal body and his transcendent
soul.
Byzantium ceased to exist long ago (it is now modern-day Istanbul), and the "sages," or wise men, the speaker reaches out
to are actually mosaics—real, famous artworks crafted from many tiny, often gilded (gold-covered) tiles. As such, the
speaker is basically imagining traveling to a long-dead holy city and talking to mosaic icons on a wall. But that's the point:
these sages have transcended old age and mortality through becoming the materials of imagination and of art. They have
left their frail, physical bodies behind.
The speaker intends to one day join them—and when he does, he’ll leave behind his body forever, and “never take / My
bodily form from any natural thing.” In teaching his soul to imagine beyond the limits of his body, and eventually to leave
it, he’ll learn to overcome mortality and old age.
Part of this transcendence will come through the art he makes. Indeed, this poem itself is both a kind of song and a kind of
mosaic: it’s musical, and it’s made of many little pieces (words, that is) put together. The art that the speaker leaves behind
is another way of surviving past the limits of his mortal body, and, like the golden bird he imagines becoming, will still
“sing” to later generations and teach them the wisdom he himself has learned.

The Power of Art

Closely related to the poem's ideas about aging, mortality, and the soul is its treatment of art. In the second half of the
poem, the speaker reaches out to the world of art—to Byzantine mosaics—for answers to the struggles of old age and
death. Art, here, is presented as a pathway to immortality. Art, the poem argues, can represent and preserve bodies that
never change, and point to a bigger, transcendent reality: not just the reality of lives now vanished, but the reality of some
different world beyond our own.
The elderly speaker, having left behind the world of the young which no longer has room for him in his frailty, goes to seek
spiritual rebirth in the ancient city of Byzantium—an ancient holy city that is now long-dead. He begins his third stanza by
invoking “sages standing in God’s holy fire / As in the gold mosaic of a wall.” Byzantium was famous for its beautiful mosaic
art, and the sages reach the immortality of “God’s holy fire” by being a part of these mosaics. That is, they are forever
preserved via art, ageless and undying. Thus, the “artifice of eternity” suggests that art both has the power to give humans
a glimpse of eternity, and is itself a way to reach that eternity for themselves.
The speaker wants to join them, in his own way, and his final vision of immortality is one that sums up the power of art—its
ability to preserve the past, exist in the present, and endure into the future. Art, the speaker insists, also can still “sing,”
speaking to future generations even after the artist is long gone.
As such, when he has learned from the sages and left behind his body, the speaker says, he will never “take / My bodily
form from any natural thing,” and describes instead taking the form of some piece of golden art. In this he might resemble
one of the mosaics in which he sees the sages. But he may also take the form of a golden bird, though he doesn’t say so
directly: in his other vision of his immortality, he sits on a bough and sings, just as the living birds in the first stanza do.
The mortal body is left behind in the transition into immortality, but the artistic body remains: the speaker wishes to
become art himself, to “sing to lords and ladies of Byzantium”—in short, to become a piece of art that might
help other mortals to become a piece of art. In this role, he would “sing” of “what is past, or passing, or to come”—
recording what was past, existing in the present, and enduring into the future.