A Zen Meditative Reconciliation of Yeats’s Creative Torpors and Fornits
Taeho Han
The Yeats Journal of Korea August 31, 2017 DOI: 10.14354/yjk.2017.53.157 (opens in new tab)
Study at a glance
AI-extracted from the abstract| Characteristics | Theoretical or philosophical paper Peer reviewed |
|---|---|
| Topics | Buddhism |
| Key points | Argues that Yeats's visionary poetry embodies a Kabbalistic creative mind and a Zen-like instinctual insight, and proposes four epistemological categories as a framework for understanding his poetics, illustrated through readings of poems in Words for Music Perhaps and "An Image for a Past Life." |
Abstract
Yeats as a visionary poet displays the basic Kabalistic creative mind or the instinctual Zen self-reawakening insight; ignorant but wise, barbarian but civilized, beastly but non-intellectually spiritual, rough but pure, which can be compared with the mysterious power of the humming bird who experiences two conflicting states of torpor and freedom. To find his poetic “fornits” (mystic elves) or poetic expediency or visionary reality that enables him to get over such poetic blocks, I meditate on his poems in Words for Music Perhaps, so called Jane’s series (poems of madness), and “An Image for a Past Life.” I theoretically delve into his four epistemological categories to holistically understand his poetics. I take up the Zen meditational Way of hermeneutical insights
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