The Lake Isle of Innisfree

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  • The Lake Isle of Innisfree
    • Form
      • Hexameter and tetrameter as well as the rhyming couplets create a sing-song type sound to them when you read them out loud, so it further backs up the idea of Innisfree as a dreamy place.
    • Context
      • Innisfree is a place that Yeats used to visit as a child, so this poem could be about him and his longing to be back in Innisfree.
    • Stanza
      • 1
        • Lines 1-2
          • Line one tells us that the speaker plans on going to Innisfree in quite a resolved tone.
          • He plans to build "a small cabin" made of "clay and wattles," again, in his determined tone. This man dreams of a rustic lifestyle.
        • Lines 3-4
          • The speaker goes on to tell us that he wants to "live alone" with nothing but the sounds from the "hive for the honeybee". He will live in a "glade" in the woods, isolated.
      • 2
        • Line 5
          • The speaker gives us their motivation for wanting to live alone- "I shall have some peace there." This suggests that maybe he is feeling trapped/restless and thinks that Innisfree is his escape from this.
        • Line 6
          • The "veils of morning," could be a metaphor for the fog/mist of early morning. This links to the idea of peace "dropping slow" from line 5.
          • "to where the cricket sings," links to the idea of nature as peace further.
        • 7-8
          • "Midnight's all a glimmer" and the idea of an evening full of "linnet's wings" helps to give Innisfree a dream like or fairy-tale like quality that makes the reader want to go to Innisfree as much as the speaker does.
      • Stanza 3
        • Lines 9-10
          • Makes it seem as though the speaker has come out of their trance as it repeats "I will arise and go now."
          • These two lines show the speakers obsession with Innisfree- he can already hear the "lake water lapping."
        • Line 11
          • Revelas to the reader that the speaker is as far away from his rural dream as possible. He isn't on the soft bed of a forest floor, but on the "pavements grey."
        • Line 12
          • "I hear it in deep heart's core" reveals the sad element to the poem. The speaker has a genuine emotional attachment to Innisfree and can hear the sounds of the "lake water lapping," in their heart, even though they may never get there.
    • Themes
      • Escape
      • Home
      • Isolation
      • Nature

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