SOURCE: Ellmann, Richard. “‘Sailing to Byzantium.’” In Yeats: The Man and the Masks, pp. 252-56. New York: E. P. Dutton & Co., Inc., 1948.

In the following essay, Ellman examines the poem's history, dramatic structure, and symbolism, and shows how the poem builds upon Yeats's earlier work and experiences.

In ‘Sailing to Byzantium’ Yeats reached the climax of this period by creating richer and more multitudinous overtones than before. He attempted here to evoke a symbol—in the poem as a whole and also in the symbolic bird spoken of in the poem—which would have a life of its own into which he could put himself:

“sailing to Byzantium”

I

That is no country for old men. The young In one another's arms, birds in the trees, —Those dying generations—at their song, The salmon-falls, the mackerel-crowded seas, Fish, flesh, or fowl, commend all summer long Whatever is begotten...