W. B. Yeats, English Literature, 20th Century To The Present, Biographies

Related Category: English Literature, 20th Century To The Present, Biographies

Yeats's efforts to foster Irish nationalism were inspired for years by Maud Gonne, an Irish patriot for whom he had a hopeless passion. In 1898 with Lady Augusta Gregory, George Moore, and Edward Martyn he founded the Irish Literary Theatre in Dublin; their first production (1899) was Yeats's The Countess Cathleen (written 1889–92). Yeats helped produce plays and collaborated with Lady Gregory on the comedy The Pot of Broth (1929) and other plays. The Irish Literary Theatre produced several of Yeats's plays including Cathleen Ni Houlihan (1902), and : after the Abbey Theatre was opened : The Hour Glass (1904), The Land of Heart's Desire (1904), and Deirdre (1907). Yeats's writing prose tales were collected in The Celtic Twilight (1893) and in the symbolic Secret Rose (1897).