1. Module B: Critical Study of Texts – Poetry of W.B. Yeats
Easter 1916

2. William Butler Yeats
1865 – 1939

3. Module B: Critical Study of Texts
Stanza Four

4. Stanza Four
Too long a sacrifice Can make a stone of the heart. O when may it suffice? That is Heaven's part, our part To murmur name upon name, As a mother names her child When sleep at last has come On limbs that had run wild. What is it but nightfall? No, no, not night but death; Was it needless death after all? For England may keep faith For all that is done and said. We know their dream; enough To know they dreamed and are dead; And what if excess of love Bewildered them till they died? I write it out in a verse- MacDonagh and MacBride And Connolly and Pearse Now and in time to be, Wherever green is worn, Are changed, changed utterly: A terrible beauty is born.

5. Stanza Four
The change in Stanza Three is contrasted with the stone, as it is presented in Stanza Three, as a symbol of permanence as it remains fixed in the “living stream”. Yeats considers this in lines 57-58, as he refers to the transformation of the heart, its mutability and its immutability; “Enchanted to a stone”. Yeats is also referring to the “one purpose” that “Too long a sacrifice” can have lasting effects on the emotional outlook of individuals. In the case of the Irish nationalists, it is the unending opposition to British rule that leads to hearts becoming stone; having a detrimental effect on the hearts of the rebels. The vision Yeats has of the world is one where all men and women have a place, a home where they will be loved. This is metaphorically expressed in “As a mother names her child/When sleep at last has come”. Here sleep is used as a metaphor for death, for the those who fought in the Easter Rising are dead. They could not change in life, they have changed in death, and the world continues to change around them.

6. Stanza Four
Yeats moves on to the result of the violence: the men and women who dream an impossible dream, the heroic dream, and as a result of their “excess of love” died for their cause, country and dream. “I write it out in a verse,” as he does in his poetry, to convey his personal response, and yet the enlightenment and understanding that will affect future readers. The poem is now elegiac as Yeats honours and memorialises the dead heroes: MacDonagh, MacBride, Connolly and Pearse. These men who made the ultimate sacrifice to their cause and united Ireland behind them. Now Yeats, using his talent as a mythographer, states that wherever the spirit of Ireland lies, represented symbolically by the colour “green”, those people will now be “changed, changed utterly”. The “terrible beauty”, dying for this heroic dream, has been born.

7. Stanza Four
Yeats moves away from the symbolism of Stanza Three to begin making sense of the sacrifice of the rebels. Had their singular purpose hardened their hearts and they had lost perspective of what was truly important? In the end, was their sacrifice worth it? In the end, the question never arose because the Easter Rising led to the Irish War of Independence and the Home Rule Bill was never enacted.

8. Stanza Four
Yeats presents a strikingly dramatic vision of the rebels in Stanza Four. We have been presented characters in Stanza Two chosen from those who are referred to in Stanza One. The “vivid faces” and reference to “motley”, and “green”, suggests costumes and roles that give a sense of the theatrical. While the actors in the “casual comedy” remain anonymous we are less likely to engage emotionally with them. However, Yeats removes the sense of ambivalence that distance awards us by naming the players in “the song”: “MacDonagh and MacBride/And Connolly and Pearse”. This draws us into the poem and forces our attention to the men who actually perished in the Easter Uprising.

9. Stanza Four
Dualism is the division of something conceptually into two opposed or contrasted aspects, or the state of being so divided.

10. Stanza Four
Yeats’s binary vision incorporates life in Ireland before and after Easter This technique was often used by war poets, such as Wilfred Owen in Disabled. He uses these dualisms, or dichotomies, to reinforce the paradoxical irony of the “terrible beauty”. The dualism of “sweet” and “shrill”, “summer” and “winter” or “stone” and “change”. The dichotomies highlight the conflict that Yeats’s is expressing: he is both optimistic and discouraged, as well as eager to share his experiences and put the “needless death” behind him.

11. Stanza Four
Ambiguity is the quality of being open to more than one interpretation; inexactness.

12. Stanza Four
Too long a sacrifice Can make a stone of the heart. O when may it suffice? That is Heaven's part, our part To murmur name upon name, As a mother names her child When sleep at last has come On limbs that had run wild. What is it but nightfall?
Yeats removes himself from the poem in Stanza Three and this continues in Stanza Four. Instead, he dedicates the final stanza to the sacrifice of the Nationalists, meditating on the necessity of that sacrifice and why the poem was written.

13. Stanza Four
Too long a sacrifice Can make a stone of the heart. O when may it suffice? That is Heaven's part, our part To murmur name upon name, As a mother names her child When sleep at last has come On limbs that had run wild. What is it but nightfall?
Ambiguity dominates the first two lines of Stanza 4, though Yeats appears to be alluding to the drawbacks of struggling for too long and the struggle of the Irish. He appears to be considering how the hearts of the Irish have hardened for good or ill.

14. Stanza Four
Too long a sacrifice Can make a stone of the heart. O when may it suffice? That is Heaven's part, our part To murmur name upon name, As a mother names her child When sleep at last has come On limbs that had run wild. What is it but nightfall?
Yeats may be referring back to previous stanzas, that a single-minded dedication to a cause could result in “a stone of the heart”. The Nationalists were steadfastly determined to achieve a free Ireland sacrificed themselves for their ideals.

15. Stanza Four
Too long a sacrifice Can make a stone of the heart. O when may it suffice? That is Heaven's part, our part To murmur name upon name, As a mother names her child When sleep at last has come On limbs that had run wild. What is it but nightfall?
The first two lines might also be a reference to the British. The execution of the revolutionary leaders was brutal and unnecessary. The British could have shown mercy and leniency to improve the relationship with Ireland.

16. Stanza Four
Too long a sacrifice Can make a stone of the heart. O when may it suffice? That is Heaven's part, our part To murmur name upon name, As a mother names her child When sleep at last has come On limbs that had run wild. What is it but nightfall?
Yeats might have been thinking of his futile pursuit of Maud Gonne who had rejected him before. His heart may have hardened in the wake of her constant refusal to marry him.

17. Stanza Four
Too long a sacrifice Can make a stone of the heart. O when may it suffice? That is Heaven's part, our part To murmur name upon name, As a mother names her child When sleep at last has come On limbs that had run wild. What is it but nightfall?
Finally, the first two lines might be a reference to Maud Gonne. The loss of her husband, her own activism and imprisonment, and opposition to British rule might have hardened her heart as well.

18. Stanza Four
Dissonance is lack of agreement or harmony between people or things.

19. Stanza Four
Too long a sacrifice Can make a stone of the heart. O when may it suffice? That is Heaven's part, our part To murmur name upon name, As a mother names her child When sleep at last has come On limbs that had run wild. What is it but nightfall?
If anything, Yeats seems to be implying that a single-minded dedication to any cause is not healthy and can lead to emotional dissonance.

20. Stanza Four
Rhetorical question is a figure of speech in the form of a question that is asked in order to make a point, rather than to elicit an answer.

21. Stanza Four
Too long a sacrifice Can make a stone of the heart. O when may it suffice? That is Heaven's part, our part To murmur name upon name, As a mother names her child When sleep at last has come On limbs that had run wild. What is it but nightfall?
Yeats questions the need for sacrifice and how much is enough? What is the price for independence and peace? The effect here again is ambiguous, is Yeats directing the question to the British or God? Or both?

22. Stanza Four
Refrain in poetry is a regularly recurring phrase or verse, especially at the end of each stanza or division of a poem or song.

23. Stanza Four
Repetition is the action of repeating something that has already been said or written.

24. Stanza Four
Simile is a figure of speech involving the comparison of one thing with another thing of a different kind, used to make a description more emphatic or vivid

25. Stanza Four
Too long a sacrifice Can make a stone of the heart. O when may it suffice? That is Heaven's part, our part To murmur name upon name, As a mother names her child When sleep at last has come On limbs that had run wild. What is it but nightfall?
Yeats states it is the responsibility of the Irish to honour the dead men. Those who sacrificed themselves for Irish independence should be remembered. The act of remembrance should be like the familiar repetition of a mother (the simile “As a mother…”) who repeats the name of her child. In this situation the mother is Ireland herself, as Yeats connects the maternal ideal with the refrain “a terrible beauty is born”.

26. Stanza Four
No, no, not night but death; Was it needless death after all? For England may keep faith For all that is done and said. We know their dream; enough To know they dreamed and are dead; And what if excess of love Bewildered them till they died?
Yeats continues to question the sacrifice of the Nationalists as a Home Rule Bill of 1912 had been passed to authorise the self-governance of Ireland in Dublin. However, the outbreak of World War I delayed the implementation of the bill. The British were not scrupulous in their measures to allow home rule and this was nothing more than rhetoric to keep the Irish quiet.

27. Stanza Four
No, no, not night but death; Was it needless death after all? For England may keep faith For all that is done and said. We know their dream; enough To know they dreamed and are dead; And what if excess of love Bewildered them till they died?
Yeats’ question reveals his doubts about his feelings towards the Easter Uprising and the Nationalists. He seems to be changing his mind. He then reaffirms the unity of purpose (“We”), stating that the cause of the Nationalists is known to all and they are dead because of their dreams. The actions of the revolutionaries does not matter, they acted and died for their cause (“What if…?”).

28. Stanza Four
No, no, not night but death; Was it needless death after all? For England may keep faith For all that is done and said. We know their dream; enough To know they dreamed and are dead; And what if excess of love Bewildered them till they died?
Yeats believes that the Nationalists were patriots and that the guilt lies with the British. The promise of self-governance was nothing more than propaganda. Finally, he believes the Nationalists took action not out of inflexible fanaticism, but out of “excess of love” for Ireland and her people.

29. Stanza Four
I write it out in a verse -- MacDonagh and MacBride And Connolly and Pearse Now and in time to be, Wherever green is worn, Are changed, changed utterly: A terrible beauty is born.
Here Yeats contrasts with line 6 of the poem, “Or polite meaningless words”, as he now supports the Nationalists, he believes their sacrifice is worthy to write down in verse. No longer are they comical figures, they are national heroes worthy of eulogising. He names them again: MacDonagh, MacBride, Connolly and Pearse. Even MacBride is a hero, a man who died and found nobility in death.

30. Stanza Four
I write it out in a verse -- MacDonagh and MacBride And Connolly and Pearse Now and in time to be, Wherever green is worn, Are changed, changed utterly: A terrible beauty is born.
In line 14, Yeats refers to the motley of a court jester (“But lived where motley is worn…”) to reinforce the comical view he has of the Nationalist initially. Now this has changed. Now the Nationalists are heroes adorned in green, the national colour of Ireland.

31. Stanza Four
I write it out in a verse -- MacDonagh and MacBride And Connolly and Pearse Now and in time to be, Wherever green is worn, Are changed, changed utterly: A terrible beauty is born.
Yeats’ poem assumes the traditional purpose of a war poem: the eulogy. It becomes a poem of remembrance of sacrifice and glorious death in war. He believes the Nationalists should be remembered for as long as there is a nation of Ireland is celebrated and its colours worn. By 1922, Home Rule became a reality. Ironically, no sooner had the Irish Free State been created than the country descended into civil war.

32. Stanza Four
Yeats further reflects on the nature of total dedication to one cause: “Too long a sacrifice/Can make a stone of the heart”. He wonders how much a dedicated person must give (“O when may it suffice?”), does it have to be to the point of death, when things might be resolved in other ways? (“Was it needless death after all?”). Again he wonders if the sacrifice was worthwhile (“what if excess of love/Bewildered them till they died?”), but in this stanza concentrates on what he is sure of: “they dreamed and are dead” and he is sure that things will never be the same again: “changed utterly”.

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