GYRES Yeats is well-known as a poet who has used a lot of symbolism in his works, especially mythological. 'The Gyres' is also one such poem where he introduces his readers to one of the most important esoteric concepts of his works - gyres. There are numerous references of circles and of re-occurring periods, as a whole, in Yeats' poems, and those references are somehow linked back to the concept of 'gyres' - conic spirals that signifies cycles of 2000 years that bring major changes in the world. Intensity of the change that a gyre cycle is capable of bringing can be evaluated by the second line of the poem - 'Things thought too long can be no longer thought (2)'. One needs extensive deciphering of symbolism when reading (and getting underlying meaning) of Yeats' poems - The Gyres is no exception. The period Yeats has in mind started with the birth of Christ and is about to end in 2000...
The cycle we learn about here in this poem, starts from civilization at its lowest ebb and then growing to the point of zenith. This duration sees upheavals, wars, and all great destruction and construction, where the times and value go on to change - 'ancient lineaments are blotted out (4)'. The poem is closely linked with 'The Second Coming', which accounts for what and how after a gyre cycle repeats itself.
Thus, the "ceremony of innocence" by which the boy was received into the tribe is now replaced with violence. Okonkwo, even though he loves the boy, kills him to avoid seeming weak. Yeats' slow-moving rough beast with a lion's body but the head of a man may seem to represent Okonkwo, at first, in Achebe's novel, given Okonkwo's violence towards other people in the novel. But while Okonkwo is certainly
They are rocked by a hand of fear, not motherly nurturance. They are obsessed by their fears, of becoming like his father in the case of Okonkwo and of not becoming like his father in Nwoye's instance. However, Nwyoe, because of the cultural and political shifts endured by his native land, has another framework of self-definition that his father lacks -- the availability of another culture, namely that of
Colonial Resistance in Things Fall Apart Chinua Achebe was born in Ogidi, Nigeria, and his father was a teacher in a missionary school. His parents were devout evangelical Protestants and christened him Albert after Prince Albert, husband of Queen Victoria, although they installed in him many of the values of their traditional Igbo culture. He attended University College in Ibadan, where he studied English, history and theology. At the university Achebe
Stress Management in the Caregiver Setting An increasing body of evidence points to the intensity of the labor involved in caring, and the impact it has on the caregiver in a healthcare setting. Whether lay or professional, it seems that the potential for suffering among caregivers is enormous. When a person reaches a state of physical, emotional or mental exhaustion, burnout occurs, and it appears to affect both lay and professional
" Okonkwo inflexible traditionalism pitted him against his gentle son Nwoye, who joined the Christian European missionaries. In the book, Oknokwo had to participate in a ceremonial human sacrifice and endure a seven-year exile after his gun accidentally killed the son of the deceased warrior Ezeudu. He also lost part of himself when he lost Ikemefuna. Upon returning to the village, he found it torn apart by Western Imperialism. Finally, he
Bright Knots of Apparitions: Transcending Reality in Fascicle Sixteen In the early eighteen sixties, many Americans were concerned with the national fracture that manifested itself in the Civil War. Northerners, galvanized by the Compromise of 1850, which held them punishable by law for aiding escaped slaves, had come to realize that this conflict involved all Americans. The nation seethed with factionalism and looked outward for direct and active solutions to a
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