Tintern Abbey and Innisfree: Nature Mysticism of Wordsworth and Yeats

William Butler Yeats has long been seen as a Romantic poet, for his celebration of Nature and emphasis on feeling, as well as his focus on subjects of a more "primitive" era. However, as Michael Schmidt explains, "Blake and Shelley had more impact on his beliefs and sentiments--his sense of poetic identity," etc. rather than the man who arguably created Romanticism, William Wordsworth himself (Schmidt 558). But there are many similarities between the two poets, particularly in "Tintern Abbey" and "The Lake Isle of Innisfree," where both recreate each place so that it is in dialogue with Nature and a sort of mysticism.

One of the clearest similarities between the two poems is the way in which the poet's respective place is viewed. In "Tintern Abbey," Wordsworth speaks of how beautiful it is there, where he sits under a sycamore tree and looks out at "these plots of cottage-ground, these orchard tufts" as well as "these pastoral farms,/green to the very door" (Wordsworth 11, 16-17). In this passage, he idealizes the countryside surrounding the ruined abbey, which can be seen in the way that he describes them in diminutive terms, and emphasizes the greenness and beauty of the land, even imagining that the "wreaths of smoke" he sees are due to an idealized "Hermit" living in the "houseless woods" (Wordsworth 17,20). Judging from what Wordsworth writes before and after this passage, it becomes clear that he somehow envies this Hermit his simple way of life, and he longs to remain in this near-solitude of the country. And through his imaginings, he engages a sort of mysticism that begins to surround the poem.

Yeats' poem, which in his recordings of the 1930's he called his "only well-known poem" has the same amount of idealization/ diminution present. In the second line, he writes that in Innisfree he will build a "small cabin" there and have only one hive, and nine bean-rows-- a very small life (Yeats 2-4). He goes on to reflect on how "midnight's all a glimmer, and noon a purple glow,/ and evening full of the linnet's wings" (Yeats 6-8). Like Wordsworth, Yeats creates this idealized landscape where all is wholly full of the simplicity of nature; unlike the dirty city of London that both allude to.

As a child in County Sligo, Yeats had heard of Innisfree and had wanted very much to go there (whether he did or not is rather unclear in his introduction). When he was twenty-three and living in London, he was walking the Strand and happened to look in a shop window where a jet of water was balancing a ball on top. He explains that it was meant to be an advertisement for refreshing drinks, but instead it made him think of the lake waters at Innisfree, and he wrote the poem (WB Yeats). This understanding of how the poem was written adds to the last line when he says "I hear it in the deep heart's core" meaning the waters of the lake (Yeats 12). And so Innisfree is symbolic of a peace and restfulness he can find nowhere else, idealized to help us understand how he feels about it, and to contrast more vividly with the "roadway, or...the pavements grey;" a place of emptiness.

Wordsworth shares a similar longing with Yeats in the way that he describes Tintern Abbey. One of the first things he tells us is that he has been away from it five years, and it is quite apparent that he missed it. Especially when he explains that even when he was in the city, he didn't forget about it: 

      But oft, in lonely rooms, and 'mid the din

      Of towns and cities, I have owed to them

      In hours of weariness, sensations sweet,

      Felt in the blood, and felt along the heart;

      And passing even into my purer mind,

      With tranquil restoration (Wordsworth 26-31).
Like in Yeats' poem, Wordsworth appears to be longing for the peaceful, cathartic atmosphere of the abbey, a very mystical quality for an abbey to have. But Wordsworth didn't mean the abbey itself (although it does inspire his thoughts) he really meant Nature, with a capital 'N.' As Yeats' poem suggests the narrator's return to Nature, so too does this visit represent a return for Wordsworth.

For both poets, this return/visit seems to be best effected through solitude. Yeats writes that he will "live alone in the bee-loud glade," one with nature (Yeats 4). Similarly, Wordsworth frequently alludes to the benefits of solitude for the mind, even though he has a lady with him, whom he refers to as his "Sister" (121). These can be seen in passages where he adjures his sister (and his readers as well) to: "[l]et the moon/ Shine on thee in thy solitary walk" so that we may store up these memories for later times and generations to share our knowledge that only comes from Nature (134-35). In this way, Wordsworth creates a more mystical persona for Nature, as the source of a type of knowledge that cannot be taught in the universities, and one which is understood with the heart rather than the mind. Yeats' poem likewise reflects a need for such knowledge in the confines of the city.

In William Butler Yeats' "The Lake Isle of Innisfree" and William Wordsworth's "Tintern Abbey" there are similar themes of a love and longing for their respective subjects, and a sense that the beauty of nature unfolds something deeper than what the industrialized world can dream of; as Wordsworth says, a glimpse into "the life of things" (48).
Sources:

WB Yeats Reading His Own Poetry. Perf. William Butler Yeats. 1937. CD. Youtube. Web. 15 Dec. 2012. <http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u2FT4_UUa4I>.

Wordsworth, William. "Composed a Few Miles from Tintern Abbey, on Revisiting the Banks of the Wye, during a Tour July 13. 1798." The Complete Poetical Works. London: Macmillan &, 1888. N. pag. Bartleby, July 1999. Web. 15 Dec. 2012.

Schmidt, Michael. "A Language Not to Be Betrayed." Lives of the Poets. New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1999. 556-568.

Yeats, W.B. "The Lake Isle of Innisfree." W.B. Yeats: The Poems. Ed. Richard J. Finneran. New York: Macmillan, 1983. 39. Print.