W.B. Yeats - Features of language, imagery, and verse form

W.B. Yeats - Features of language, imagery, and verse form

Language

• Use of puns to give different meanings  and open interpretation
• Ambiguous words and phrases to widen meaning and suggest different interpretations. Sometimes Yeats is difficult to tie down on specific meaning and it was his intention that the reader explore different meanings
• Frequent use of questions, sometimes rhetorical, to involve the reader and push us to consider different viewpoints
• Some of the poems are distinctly rhetorical in style, usually when considering current political issues
• Repetition of words and ideas that give special significance
• Frequent exclamation to emphasise mood or to change mood
• Use of real people and places to give a strong sense of location and roots the poem in a specific time
• Juxtaposed with this is the use of myth and legend to give a different view…