This Blog is written as part of the Thinking Activity assigned by Prof. Dr. Dilip Barad (Department Of English, MKBU) in the study of W. B. Yeats’s modern poetry. The purpose of this task is to develop a critical understanding of Yeats’s poetic response to war, chaos, and the decline of civilization as reflected in “The Second Coming” and “On Being Asked for a War Poem.”
The following analysis is based on insights from the above video lecture. It helps explore Yeats’s poetic response to war, chaos, and the crisis of faith.
- 3 Surprising Ways to Read a 100-Year-Old Poem That Predicted Our Chaotic World
"Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold;"
In a world defined by uncertainty and upheaval, these century-old lines from W.B. Yeats's poem "The Second Coming" have become a constant, almost reflexive, refrain. Written in 1919, the poem is a cult classic, frequently cited to capture our modern sense of chaos, yet it is often understood through a single, limited lens.
Most people read "The Second Coming" as a direct response to the devastation of World War I. While that interpretation is correct, it is incomplete. This article will explore three distinct layers of meaning within the poem, culminating in a recently uncovered interpretation that was hidden in plain sight one that makes Yeats’s masterpiece chillingly relevant to our own pandemic era.
1. The Obvious Reading: A World Shattered by War and Revolution
On its surface, "The Second Coming" is a telegram from a world on fire, its meaning seemingly anchored in the historical turmoil of 1919. The poem is a direct reflection of the anxiety that permeated Europe as World War I was ending. Yeats was grappling not only with the aftermath of a global conflict but also with the seismic shock of the Russian Revolution and the brewing violence of the Irish revolutionary movement, which was unfolding on his very "doorstep."
The poem's opening images brilliantly capture this sense of a civilization staring into the abyss. Yeats describes a "widening gyre," an apocalyptic image of destructive force. This is no mere spiral; it is an "eruption of the air circulation," a cyclone so powerful it "lifts houses cars vehicles," tearing the world from its foundations. The falcon, a trained hunter, can no longer hear the call of its master, symbolizing a world that has broken free from its traditional structures and authorities.
The falcon cannot hear the falconer; Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold; Mere anarchy is loosed upon the world,
In this reading, the poem is a powerful lament for the disintegration of 20th-century European civilization, a world where long-held convictions have evaporated, leaving only chaos in their wake.
2. The Spiritual Reading: A Crisis of Faith and a Terrifying New God
But political chaos alone doesn't explain the poem's terrifying, mystical power. To understand that, we must look beyond the battlefield and into the crisis of the soul. The poem's title, "The Second Coming," is a deliberate and provocative invocation of the Biblical promise of Jesus Christ's return. But instead of fulfilling this prophecy of salvation, Yeats radically subverts it, transforming a promise of hope into a vision of horror.
A terrifying new figure emerges not from heaven, but from the Spiritus Mundi what Yeats conceived as a "universal memory" or "memory bank," a concept akin to Carl Jung's "collective unconscious" that provides inspiration to poets. Instead of a savior, a monstrous "shape with lion body and the head of a man" emerges, its "gaze blank and pitiless as the sun" as it "slouches towards Bethlehem to be born."
This shocking image reflects a profound spiritual vacuum. The Christian religion, built on the message of compassion "if somebody is beating you offer another cheek" had utterly failed to prevent the mechanized slaughter of millions in the Great War. The bitter irony was inescapable. The old god was gone. In his place, Yeats envisioned a new deity for a new, brutal age: not a figure of hope, but a pitiless monster.
3. The Shocking Reading: The Pandemic Hidden in Plain Sight
But the most chilling reading of "The Second Coming" is the one that was silenced for a century, hidden not in metaphor, but in the tragic reality of biology. For decades, a crucial influence on the poem was almost completely erased from history: the 1918-1919 Spanish Flu pandemic. This interpretation, powerfully articulated in Elizabeth Outka's book Viral Modernism, reveals a layer of meaning that is both deeply personal and shockingly immediate.
The biographical link is critical. While Yeats was writing the poem, his pregnant wife, Georgie Hyde-Lees, was stricken with the Spanish Flu and was "very close to death." The situation was terrifyingly grim; the death rate for pregnant women during the pandemic was as high as 70% in some areas.
With this knowledge, the poem's most visceral images snap into focus, transforming from abstract symbols into literal descriptions of the flu's horrific effects. The line "The blood-dimmed tide is loosed" ceases to be a metaphor for war. A frequent and terrible symptom of this influenza was severe, uncontrollable bleeding from the nose, mouth, and ears veritable "floods of blood." The declaration that "The ceremony of innocence is drowned" takes on a harrowing, literal meaning, as patients drowned in their own beds when their lungs filled with fluid. This was the exact danger facing Yeats's wife and his unborn child as he sat down to write.
In this light, the "rough beast" is no longer just a symbol of anarchy. It becomes a "terrific description of pandemic"—an amorphous threat that coalesces from the invisible virus, a "hallucination" born of fear and delirium. The creature's strange form is the shape terror takes when the enemy is everywhere and nowhere at once.
When you read it through the lens of the pandemic, this other poem begins to emerge.
Conclusion: A Poem for Our Time
"The Second Coming" is not one poem, but three. It is a document of political chaos, a howl of spiritual crisis, and, most surprisingly, a hidden testament to the trauma of a global pandemic.
This final reading makes Yeats's work feel less like a historical artifact and more like a dispatch written for our own time. It reveals how an invisible, airborne threat can shape our art and consciousness. It also stands as a stark warning about historical amnesia. As one professor of modernist literature admitted, for years of teaching, "there was absolutely no reference to spanish flu... it seems like pandemic was almost erased from the history."
If a global pandemic could be forgotten as a primary influence on one of the 20th century's most famous poems, what crucial stories from our own turbulent era are we failing to see, and what will it take for future generations to read them?
2. On being asked for a War Poem
- Yeats, Pandemics, and Propaganda: 3 Surprising Truths Behind His Most Famous Poems
W.B. Yeats is often remembered as a titan of modern literature a poet of dense symbolism, Irish myth, and intricate, mystical systems. To many, he can seem complex, even difficult. But behind his most famous works lie surprising, counter-intuitive, and deeply relevant stories about the raw realities of his time: politics, pandemics, and the true role of the artist in a world of crisis.
This article explores three impactful takeaways, drawn from deep analysis of his work, that reveal a poet far more engaged with the turbulent world around him than is commonly understood.
His Refusal to Write a War Poem Was His War Poem
In 1915, at the height of World War I, the prominent writers Henry James and Edith Wharton asked Yeats to contribute a poem to The Book of the Homeless, an anthology Wharton was compiling to support war refugees. His response was a masterstroke of artistic defiance. Instead of a patriotic ode, he wrote a short poem explaining precisely why a poet's "mouth be silent" in such times.
The poem's power is revealed in its own evolution. Its initial title was a personal note: "To a friend who has asked me to sign his manifesto to the neutral nations." It was later published as "A reason for keeping silent," shifting the focus to artistic principle. Only in its final form did it become the iconic "On Being Asked for a War Poem." This journey shows a mind deliberately crafting his silence. This was no simple evasion; it was a form of "refusal as ascent," where the very act of saying "no" through a poem became a more potent statement than saying "yes." He argued that the artist's power is fundamentally different from, and often powerless against, the machinery of the state. As he wrote:
we have no gift to set a state's men right
In an era of intense patriotic fervor, Yeats's poem was not an act of cowardice but a profound political statement. It asserted that a poet's duty is not to serve as a propagandist but to operate on a different plane of truth.
A Pandemic, Not Just War, Fueled His Vision of Chaos
Yeats's most famous poem, "The Second Coming," is legendary for its chilling prophecy of societal collapse. Its lines about a world where "Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold" are quoted endlessly to describe political and social breakdown. While the poem has traditionally been read through political or religious lenses, modern scholarship has uncovered a third, visceral context that re-frames the entire work.
Just before writing the poem in 1919, Yeats’s pregnant wife, Georgie, was stricken by the Spanish Flu pandemic and came perilously close to death. It was a terrifying ordeal; the death rate for pregnant women reached as high as 70% in some areas. When read through this biographical lens, the poem's apocalyptic imagery takes on a startlingly new meaning.
The line "The blood-dimmed tide is loosed" powerfully evokes a common and horrific symptom of the flu: severe bleeding from the nose, mouth, and ears. The phrase "the ceremony of innocence is drowned" resonates with the way victims' lungs filled with fluid, literally drowning them. The monstrous "rough beast" slouching towards Bethlehem becomes not just a symbol of political anarchy, but a "terrific description of pandemic"—an invisible, terrifying, and lurching threat born from delirium and personal horror. The poem’s famous couplet feels just as relevant to public health crises as to political ones:
The best lack all conviction, while the worst Are full of passionate intensity.
This pandemic reading makes a century-old poem feel startlingly contemporary, transforming it from a grand political prophecy into a deeply personal account of fear, sickness, and survival.
The Poet's Real Fight Was Against the Politician's Narrative
Yeats's refusal to write a pro-war poem was not an apolitical act; it was rooted in his identity as a fierce Irish nationalist engaged in the "longest struggle for Irish independence." He was fundamentally opposed to the British cause in World War I, a sentiment sharpened by events like the Easter Rising of 1916. He could not write a patriotic poem for a nation he considered an oppressor. The conflicted loyalties of Irishmen fighting for their colonizer is a theme he explored in other works, like his poem "An Irish Airman Foresees His Death."
His private letters reveal his unfiltered thoughts. Writing to his friend Lady Gregory, he was scathing:
I suppose like most wars it is at root a bag man's war... a sacrifice of the best for the worst.
In another letter, to John Quinn, he dismissed the entire conflict as "merely the most expensive outbreak of insolence and stupidity the world has ever seen."
Yeats believed the poet's ultimate role was not to be a propagandist or to correct politicians. He felt the artist’s true domain was the timeless, internal aspects of human life. His work was to tend to the experience of "a young girl in the indolence of her youth or an old man upon a winter's night." His poetic "silence" on the war was therefore a deliberate choice to reject the "rightful statements" of statesmen and, in doing so, protect a different, more human, and more enduring form of truth.
A Final Thought
Far from being an aloof mystic escaping into art, W.B. Yeats was a deeply engaged artist whose work grappled with the most pressing crises of his time war, political propaganda, and even global pandemic. He used his art not to offer simple answers, but to question the very nature of art's role in a world tearing itself apart.
In our own turbulent times, what is the artist's ultimate responsibility: to amplify the rallying cries of the moment, or to safeguard the truths that lie beyond them?
2. Watch Hindi podcast on both poems from the blog link. Embed the videos and write brief note on your understanding of this podcast
Understanding “On Being Asked for a War Poem” and “The Second Coming” by W. B. Yeats
Based on the discussion in the video podcast, Yeats’s poems emerge not as distant literary texts but as deeply engaged responses to the crises of his time war, political pressure, and pandemic trauma. Together, “On Being Asked for a War Poem” and “The Second Coming” reveal Yeats’s complex understanding of the poet’s role in moments of historical collapse.
1. On Being Asked for a War Poem: Silence as Resistance
At first glance, “On Being Asked for a War Poem” appears simple and restrained. Written in 1915 during the First World War, the poem responds to Yeats being asked to contribute a patriotic poem for a war-relief anthology. Instead of complying, Yeats writes a poem explaining why a poet should remain silent during such times.
This “silence,” however, is not apolitical. As the podcast explains, Yeats was an Irish nationalist living under British rule. Writing a patriotic poem for the British Empire his nation’s colonizer was morally impossible for him. His refusal becomes a powerful political gesture. By stating that poets have “no gift to set a state’s men right,” Yeats draws a sharp distinction between the poet’s truth and the politician’s “right.”
The poem argues that a poet’s responsibility lies not in propaganda or political correction, but in preserving human experience writing songs for the young or stories for the old. In a time when everyone was forced to take sides, Yeats’s refusal itself becomes an act of protest. The poem suggests that not speaking can sometimes be more ethical than speaking falsely.
2. The Second Coming: A World Falling Apart
Written in 1919, “The Second Coming” appears at first to contradict Yeats’s earlier call for poetic silence. This poem is loud, violent, and apocalyptic. Its famous opening “Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold”captures the extreme instability of the post-war world.
Traditionally, the poem is read as a response to World War I, the Russian Revolution, and Ireland’s political unrest. The image of the widening gyre suggests the collapse of old systems and beliefs. The Christian promise of salvation through the “Second Coming” is overturned; instead of Christ, a terrifying “rough beast” moves toward Bethlehem, signaling the birth of a brutal new age.
Yeats’s mystical philosophy of history, based on 2000-year cycles (gyres), informs this vision. For him, the Christian era was ending, and a violent, irrational epoch was beginning.
3. The Pandemic Perspective: Elizabeth Outka’s Insight
The podcast introduces a crucial modern interpretation developed by scholar Elizabeth Outka, who argues that “The Second Coming” must also be read through the lens of the 1918 Spanish Flu pandemica context long ignored by literary critics.
This pandemic was not an abstract event for Yeats. While he was writing the poem, his pregnant wife, Georgie, was critically ill with the flu and close to death. Understanding this personal trauma transforms the poem’s imagery. Phrases like “the blood-dimmed tide is loosed” can be read not only as war imagery, but as literal references to the flu’s symptoms, which included severe bleeding. “The ceremony of innocence is drowned” evokes the way victims suffocated as their lungs filled with fluid an especially haunting image given Yeats’s fear for his wife and unborn child.
In this reading, the “rough beast” becomes a powerful symbol of the virus itself: invisible, faceless, indifferent, and unstoppable. Unlike war, a pandemic has no enemy with a face. Its blank, pitiless gaze mirrors the random cruelty of disease.
4. Reading the Two Poems Together
When read together, the two poems offer a coherent vision of Yeats’s artistic philosophy. In “On Being Asked for a War Poem,” Yeats refuses to engage in narrow political messaging. In “The Second Coming,” he does not address politicians at all; instead, he confronts the total collapse of political, spiritual, and biological order.
Yeats does not contradict himself he evolves. He avoids propaganda but refuses silence when the entire human world is unraveling. His poetry becomes a space where war, nationalism, pandemic fear, and spiritual crisis intersect.
Conclusion
Based on the podcast, these poems show Yeats as neither detached nor escapist. He was a poet deeply shaped by his historical moment, who resisted political simplification and captured the layered reality of crisis. His work reminds us that poetry does not merely record events it reveals how those events are lived, feared, and endured.
In an age marked by political polarization, misinformation, and global pandemics, Yeats’s century-old poems continue to speak with unsettling clarity, asking the same question they asked in his time: what should an artist do when the world itself seems to be falling apart?
3. Refer to the study material - researchgate: Reply in the blog to the (i) Discussion question, (ii) Creativity activity and (iii) Analytical exercise
Click here : Researchgate material
1 Discussion Questions
1. How does Yeats use imagery to convey a sense of disintegration in The SecondComing?
Introduction
In “The Second Coming,” W.B. Yeats uses vivid and symbolic imagery to express a powerful sense of disintegration, chaos, and loss of order in the modern world. His images portray the breakdown of civilization, morality, and spirituality in the aftermath of war and social upheaval.
1. The Image of the Widening Gyre
“Turning and turning in the widening gyre / The falcon cannot hear the falconer.”
- The “widening gyre” symbolizes the collapse of control and order.
- The falcon and falconer image shows a loss of connection between man and his guiding principles, between authority and obedience, or between God and humanity.
- It reflects the disintegration of harmony and unity that once held society together.
2. Collapse of Moral and Social Order
“Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold; / Mere anarchy is loosed upon the world.”
- This is one of the most famous images of civilizational decay in literature.
- The “centre” represents moral and spiritual stability, and its collapse shows that no central value or belief system remains to hold the world together.
“Anarchy” suggests chaos, violence, and confusion, dominating the modern age.
3. The “Blood-Dimmed Tide” and Loss of Innocence
- “The blood-dimmed tide is loosed, and everywhere / The ceremony of innocence is drowned.”
- The “blood-dimmed tide” symbolizes war, destruction, and moral corruption sweeping across humanity.
- The drowning of the “ceremony of innocence” represents the death of purity, faith, and moral values.
- This imagery captures the spiritual darkness of the 20th century after the World War.
4. The Monstrous Vision: The Rough Beast
“A shape with lion body and the head of a man, / A gaze blank and pitiless as the sun.”
- This terrifying image shows the birth of a new and inhuman era.
- The creature’s “blank and pitiless” gaze reflects the absence of compassion or divine order in the modern world.
- It symbolizes a monstrous future, where violence and evil replace faith and innocence.
5. The Final Image of Doom
“And what rough beast, its hour come round at last, / Slouches towards Bethlehem to be born?”
The “rough beast” is an anti-Christ figure, representing the emergence of evil and destruction instead of salvation.
The verb “slouches” suggests decay, heaviness, and degeneration, emphasizing the moral downfall of civilization.
Conclusion
Through a series of powerful, symbolic, and apocalyptic images, Yeats vividly portrays a world falling apart—a civilization losing its moral, spiritual, and social foundations. The images of the widening gyre, the blood-dimmed tide, and the rough beast collectively convey a vision of disintegration, making “The Second Coming” one of the most haunting depictions of modern chaos and despair in English poetry.
2. Do you agree with Yeats’s assertion in On Being Asked for a War Poem that poetry should remain apolitical? Why or why not?
Introduction
I partially agree with W.B. Yeats’s assertion in On Being Asked for a War Poem that poetry should remain apolitical, but the relevance of this view depends on the poet’s intention, context, and the nature of the crisis. Yeats presents a philosophical and modernist perspective, emphasizing that poetry’s highest purpose is to explore timeless truths and spiritual reflection, rather than serving immediate political needs.
1. Yeats’s Perspective
In the poem, Yeats states:
“I think it better that in times like these / A poet’s mouth be silent, for in truth / We have no gift to set a statesman right.”
This line reveals several important ideas:
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Poetry as a spiritual and artistic pursuit: Yeats views poetry not as a tool for propaganda or political commentary, but as a medium for exploring universal human experience and enduring truths.
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Recognition of limits: The poet cannot directly influence political outcomes or advise leaders; the poet’s domain is reflection and insight, not governance.
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Modernist detachment: Yeats aligns with modernist ideals of distancing the poet from direct political engagement, emphasizing existential and philosophical observation over emotional or political reaction.
2. Arguments Supporting Yeats’s View
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Preservation of Artistic Integrity:
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Poetry risks being reduced to propaganda or moralizing if it engages directly with political issues.
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By remaining apolitical, the poet ensures that literary quality, imagination, and universality are maintained.
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Acknowledgment of Poet’s Limitations:
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Poets cannot correct statesmen or solve political crises.
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Yeats’s emphasis on the limitations of influence underscores that poetry’s strength lies in interpretation, insight, and ethical reflection, not practical intervention.
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Timelessness of Poetry:
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Politically charged poetry often reflects the immediate historical moment, making it less relevant over time.
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Apolitical poetry can achieve a universal and enduring resonance, addressing fundamental human experiences beyond the ephemeral concerns of politics.
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3. Arguments Against Yeats’s View
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Historical Precedent of Political Poetry:
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Many poets have historically engaged directly with politics, especially in times of crisis.
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Wilfred Owen and Siegfried Sassoon, for instance, wrote war poetry that exposed the brutal realities of World War I, challenging glorified notions of heroism and national pride.
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Moral Responsibility of the Poet:
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In periods of social unrest or conflict, poets may feel compelled to bear witness to injustice.
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Choosing silence could be seen as complicity or moral detachment, undermining poetry’s ethical function.
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The Political Nature of Art:
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Even seemingly apolitical works reflect social and historical contexts.
- Yeats’s approach does not deny the value of politically engaged poetry; rather, it emphasizes a personal choice rooted in artistic priorities.
- Politically engaged poets like Owen and Sassoon show that poetry can illuminate human suffering and challenge social injustice, while still achieving high artistic quality.
- Both approaches are valid: apolitical poetry offers timeless philosophical reflection, whereas political poetry engages with immediate social and historical realities.
“The Last Tide”Turning and turning in a fractured orbit,The cities hum beneath neon smog;The rivers choke on plastic ghosts,And the forests whisper in ash.Things fall apart; the center cannot hold;Mere anarchy spreads through digital veins,While leaders speak in polished screensAnd the hungry scroll past the fire.A shape rises from melting ice:Half-machine, half-beast, eyes empty as the void,Its shadow crawling across continents,Counting the centuries we failed to heed.The ceremony of innocence is drowned,By rising tides and silent alarms;Yet still, in quiet corners, a voice murmurs,A plea for reason, for remembrance, for care.And what rough beast, its hour come at last,Slouches toward tomorrow on carbon wings,Its claws deep in the history we ignored,Its roar the echo of our own making.
- Critique of Authority: Sassoon exposes the detachment and incompetence of leaders:
- Emotional Outrage: Sassoon’s tone conveys anger and moral indignation at the senseless waste of life.
- Direct Engagement: Unlike Yeats, Sassoon uses poetry as protest and social commentary, confronting injustice and demanding accountability.
5. Commonalities
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All three poets reject the romanticization of war.
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Each explores the moral, psychological, and social consequences of conflict.
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While their methods differ, all question traditional notions of heroism and patriotism.
Conclusion
Yeats’s On Being Asked for a War Poem exemplifies philosophical reflection and modernist detachment, emphasizing the poet’s spiritual and ethical observation rather than direct engagement with war. In contrast, Owen and Sassoon confront war’s physical, emotional, and social realities with vivid imagery, empathy, and satire. Together, these poets provide a multifaceted literary perspective, ranging from introspective contemplation to urgent moral and social critique.
References:
Barad, Dilip. “WBYeats Poems.” Dilip Barad | Teacher Blog, 20 May 2021, https://blog.dilipbarad.com/2021/05/whauden-poems.html. Accessed 26 Dec. 2025.
Barad, Dilip. W.B. Yeats’s Poems: The Second Coming & On Being Asked for a War Poem. ResearchGate, Jan. 2025, https://www.researchgate.net/publication/387659837_WB_Yeats%27s_Poems_The_Second_Coming_On_Being_Asked_for_a_War_Poem. Accessed 27 Dec. 2025.
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