Even though I have known for years that Yeats died in 1939, I never thought of him in an age of radio, but I just discovered him reading "The Fiddler of Dooney" for the BBC in 1935. "The Lake Isle of Innisfree" is even more incantatory, to the point where the poet has set his own words almost to music; it's spoken, but it has a tune. I had never heard his voice. Looking for more recordings, I found him in 1936 praising Edith Sitwell, which makes me feel that it doesn't matter if I agree about her poetry specifically, just the fact that he doesn't trash the next generation's poets who smashed the patterns of his old mythologies counts with me. In the continuing absence of the Internet Archive, I could not locate the full text of that radio talk, but I read enough of it to run into the line, "I think profound philosophy must come from terror."
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- 1: Sing the praise of Alexander, he's no use to me
- 2: The hedges and fields are clothed all around with several sorts of green
- 3: Chinatown, London Underground, you know it all sounds good to me
- 4: Take us roaming in the gloaming, your Ross rifle by your side
- 5: I'm singing out this poem all the way back home
- 6: Pa vez o pellaat da vag, ha ma c'hoantaez c'hoazh?
- 7: I spoke of crimes and of my friends in the same breath
- 8: You've got to live the life you're fighting for
- 9: Neuial a ran dre ar ruzenn
- 10: We have come to dance this dance to please the company
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- Style: Classic for Refried Tablet by and
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