The Collected Works of W.B. Yeats Volume VIII: The Irish Dramatic Movement

275 Pages·2003·1.49 MB·English

by  William B. Yeats

The Irish Dramatic Movement
Mary FitzGerald Richard J. Finneran
SCRIBNER
NEW YORK LONDON TORONTO SYDNEY SINGAPORE
THE COLLECTED WORKS OF W. B. YEATS
VOLUME VIII
THE COLLECTED WORKS OF W. B. YEATS
Richard J. Finneran and George Mills Harper, General Editors
VOLUME I THE POEMS
ed. Richard J. Finneran
VOLUME II THE PLAYS
ed. David R. Clark and Rosalind E. Clark
VOLUME III AUTOBIOGRAPHIES
ed.William H. O’Donnell and Douglas Archibald
VOLUME IV EARLY ESSAYS
ed. George Bornstein and Richard J. Finneran
VOLUME V LATER ESSAYS
ed.William H. O’Donnell
VOLUME VI PREFACES AND INTRODUCTIONS
ed.William H. O’Donnell
VOLUME VII LETTERS TO THE NEW ISLAND
ed.George Bornstein and Hugh Witemeyer
VOLUME VIII THE IRISH DRAMATIC MOVEMENT
ed. Mary FitzGerald and Richard J. Finneran
VOLUME IX EARLY ARTICLES AND REVIEWS
ed. John P. Frayne and Madeleine Marchaterre
VOLUME X LATER ARTICLES AND REVIEWS
ed. Colton Johnson
VOLUME XI MYTHOLOGIES
ed.Warwick Gould and Deirdre Toomey
VOLUME XII JOHN SHERMAN AND DHOYA ed. Richard J. Finneran
VOLUME XIII A VISION (1925)
ed. Margaret Mills Harper and Catherine Paul
VOLUME XIV A VISION (1937)
ed. Margaret Mills Harper and Catherine Paul
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Copyright © 2003 by Anne Yeats
Editorial notes, introduction, and compilation copyright © 2003 by Richard J.
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1 3 5 7 9 10 8 6 4 2
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Yeats, W. B. (William
Butler), 1865-1939.
The Irish dramatic movement ÷ W. B. Yeats ;
edited by Mary FitzGerald and Richard J. Finneran.
p. cm.—(The collected works of W. B. Yeats ; v. 8) Includes index.
1. English drama—Irish authors—History and criticism. 2. Theater—Ireland—
History. 3. Ireland—Intellectual life. 4. Ireland—In literature. I. FitzGerald,
Mary, 1946-2000. II. Finneran, Richard J. III. Title.
PR5900.A2 F56 1989 vol. 8 [PR5900.A5]
821′.8 s—dc21 [792′.09415] 2002044669
ISBN 0-684-80706-8
eISBN-13: 978-1-43910612-9
Dedication
To George Bornstein, friend of us both
PREFACE AND ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
As early as 1919, Yeats hoped to see his early dramatic criticism, first published
in a series of pamphlets and collected only as part of one of the volumes in an
expensive collected edition in 1908, available in a separate, regular edition.
Although more often than not successful in his dealings with publishers, in this
instance Yeats eventually had to be content with The Irish Dramatic Movement
as a section of the 1923 Plays and Controversies. If either of the two expensive
collected editions planned in the 1930s had come to fruition, The Irish Dramatic
Movement would have still been denied a volume of its own, sharing space with
the early prose fiction. After Yeats’s death the work was finally published in a
rather miscellaneous collection of prose, Explorations (1962). The present
edition is thus a belated fulfillment of Yeats’s wish. To The Irish Dramatic
Movement as Yeats last approved it has been added the uncollected material from
the original pamphlets.
As with any editorial endeavor, this volume would not have been possible
without the assistance of many others. We are especially indebted to Joseph
Black; George Bornstein; D. Allen Carroll; Kathleen Clune; Morris Eaves;
Robert Essick; Nora FitzGerald; Ed Folsom; Roy Foster; John Frayne; Stan
Garner; Nancy Moore Goslee; John E. Grant; George Mills Harper; Margaret
Mills Harper; Thomas Heffernan; George Hutchinson; K. P. S. Jochum; Mary
Lynn Johnson; Declan Kiely; J. C. C. Mays; Jerome McGann; William H.
O’Donnell; Morton Paley; Alan Raitt; Peter Robinson; Ann Saddlemyer; Ronald
Schuchard; Colin Smythe; Mary Speer; Wayne Storey; Jeff Tamaroff; Joseph
Trahern; Anne Yeats; and Michael B. Yeats. We are also grateful to the staffs of
the Berg Collection, New York Public Library; the British Library; the National
Library of Ireland; the University of North Carolina Library; and the University
of Tennessee Library. A special thanks goes to my graduate students Stephen
Holcombe and Lauren Todd Taylor for their tireless efforts in tracking down
some of Yeats’s obscure allusions.
We are also grateful to Sarah McGrath at Scribner for her support of this edition
and to John McGhee for his care in seeing the manuscript through the press.
Mary FitzGerald died from metastatic breast cancer on 8 August 2000, before
this edition could be finished. It has been my privilege to bring it to completion.
To her many students, friends, and colleagues, Mary was known as a superb
teacher, a generous and loving companion, and a fine scholar. Only Richard
Edmond, Catherine Anne, and I also knew her as the very model of a mother and
a wife. As Yeats once wrote,
time may bring Approved patterns of women or of men But not that selfsame
excellence again.
R.J.F.
Wildwood, Missouri
15 March 2002
CONTENTS
Preface and Acknowledgments
Abbreviations
Introduction
The Irish Dramatic Movement
Samhain: 1901
Samhain: 1902
Samhain: 1903
Samhain: 1903—The Reform of the Theatre
Samhain: 1903—Moral and Immoral Plays
Samhain: 1903—An Irish National Theatre
Samhain: 1903—The Theatre, the Pulpit, and the Newspapers
Samhain: 1904—The Dramatic Movement
Samhain: 1904—First Principles
Samhain: 1904—The Play, the Player, and the Scene
Samhain: 1905
Samhain: 1906—Literature and the Living Voice
The Arrow: 20 October 1906—The Season’s Work
The Arrow: 23 February 1907—The Controversy Over The Playboy of
the Western World
The Arrow: 1 June 1907—On Taking The Playboy to London
Samhain: 1908—First Principles
A People’s Theatre: A Letter to Lady Gregory
Prefaces and Note
[Preface] in The Collected Works in Verse and Prose (1908)
Preface to Plays and Controversies (1923)
Note in Mythologies (Edition de Luxe proofs, 1931-32)
Uncollected Contributions to Beltaine,Samhain,and The Arrow
Beltaine: May 1899—Plans and Methods
Beltaine: May 1899—The Theatre
Beltaine: February 1900—Plans and Methods
Beltaine: February 1900—Maeve, and certain Irish Beliefs
Beltaine: February 1900—[Note] to Alice Milligan’s The Last Feast of
the Fianna
Beltaine: February 1900—The Irish Literary Theatre, 1900
Beltaine: April 1900—The Last Feast of the Fianna, Maeve, and The
Bending of the Bough, in Dublin
Samhain: 1901—from Windlestraws
Samhain: 1901—[Note] to George Moore’s “The Irish Literary Theatre”
Samhain: 1902—from Notes
Samhain: 1902—[Note] to AE’s “The Dramatic Treatment of Heroic
Literature”
Samhain: 1903—from Notes
Samhain: 1904—[Interpolations]
Samhain: 1904—Miss Horniman’s Offer of Theatre and the Society’s
Acceptance
Samhain: 1904—from An Opinion
The Arrow: 20 October 1906—from The Season’s Work
The Arrow: 20 October 1906—A Note on The Mineral Workers
The Arrow: 20 October 1906—The Irish Peasant on Hyacinth Halvey
The Arrow: 20 October 1906—[Notes]
The Arrow: 24 November 1906—[Notes]
The Arrow: 24 November 1906—Deirdre
The Arrow: 24 November 1906—The Shadowy Waters