In “Poetry” Marianne Moore makes references that allude to three significant literary figures: Samuel Butler, William Butler Yeats, and William Blake (via Yeats). A more in-depth look at them will help to illuminate “Poetry” further.
Samuel Butler (1835-1902), perhaps best known for his translations of the Odyssey and the Iliad, was an English novelist and poet, art critic, and literary critic. He was supposed to follow his father into the priesthood, but had an antagonistic relationship with his family. He studied Classics at St. John’s College at Cambridge and, over time, began to question his faith. He left for New Zealand in 1859, and there composed his masterpiece Erewhon, heavily based on the writings of Darwin. He returned to England and lived there for the rest of his life, with occasional sojourns to Italy. His work was highly admired by George Bernard Shaw and E.M. Forster as well as Aldous Huxley. An unfinished later work, The Way of All Flesh, attracted writers for its psychoanalytic themes, and his keen satiric voice in an era of Victorian abstemiousness and idealism influenced later writers.
William Blake (1757-1827) was one of the most famous Romantic poets as well as an accomplished visual artist (his illustrations of Dante’s Inferno are revered for their haunting beauty). In his childhood Blake claimed he had visions, and he was thus schooled at home since other children found him very strange. He learned to read, write, and draw. He began writing poetry when he was 12 years old. At age 14 he apprenticed to an engraver, and then studied at the Royal Academy for a time after his apprenticeship ended. He married in 1782 and taught his new wife how to read; while they had no children, they collaborated on printing the illuminated poetry for which he became famous. Blake made money through engraving and illustrating books and magazines. He was very close to his brother Robert, whom he taught to draw, paint, and engrave; when Robert suddenly passed away from illness, Blake claimed he saw his brother’s spirit rise to the ceiling in a state of joy. He later said Robert taught him in a dream the printing method he would use in “Songs of Innocence” (1789) and other works. “Songs of Innocence” and 1794’s “Songs of Experience” appear relatively simple but in fact contain complex parody and critique. Blake's philosophy, privileging imagination over reason, was radical in his day. Inner vision was more important for artistic creation than was the observation of nature. He condemned theological tyranny and oppressive authority. In the early 1800s he began to experience more intense visions, and his work became more profound and abstruse. He hoped that regular people would read his poetry, but it was not well-known during his day. His art was shown in 1808 at the Royal Academy, but it garnered mixed reviews. Some of his literary contemporaries revered him, however; Samuel Taylor Coleridge called him a “man of Genius.” Although later years saw him in financial straits, he maintained contact with young artists, and was commissioned to illustrate Dante’s Divine Comedy in 1827.
William Butler Yeats (1865-1939) initially studied painting but then turned his attention to poetry. He was part of the Celtic Revival, a movement of intellectuals who opposed English rule in Ireland and promoted the Irish spirit. Influential friends of his included Oscar Wilde and George Bernard Shaw. He was very interested in Irish mythology and folklore and incorporated it into his work. He was also quite political and felt exceedingly pessimistic about the situation in his country. Ezra Pound and T.S. Eliot’s work influenced his poems, but he tended to adhere to traditional verse forms. He also incorporated mysticism and the occult, and his poetry became increasingly idiosyncratic. In 1922 he was appointed a senator of the Irish Free State, and the following year received the Nobel Prize; the committee awarded it based on “his always inspired poetry, which in a highly artistic form gives expression to the spirit of a whole nation."
