今天要学的诗歌是The Lake Isle of Innisfree，作者是英国著名诗人，叶芝William Butler Yeats，他的“当你老了”这首诗在中国可谓家喻户晓，也被改编成了流行歌曲传唱。
这首The Lake Isle of Innisfree是叶芝受了小时候父亲给他朗读的梭罗THOREAU创作的小说《瓦尔登湖》的影响，憧憬着自己有朝一日也能生活在类似的与世隔绝的小岛上。这首诗就是他对梦中小岛的描述：在湖中间用clay和wattles建造a small cabin，种上9排豆角，养上蜂巢，享受每天清晨到黄昏的光线变幻，听着湖水水岸，红雀振翅，蟋蟀吟唱，希望通过平静的大自然独居生活，直抵他内心的平静。
Background背景介绍
Photograph of William Butler Yeats taken in 1890叶芝本人照片摄于1890年
When Yeats was a child, his father had read to him from Walden, by Henry David Thoreau, and Yeats described his inspiration for the poem by saying that while he was a teenager, he wished to imitate Thoreau by living on Innisfree, an uninhabited island in Lough Gill.[3] He suggests that when he was living in London, he would walk down Fleet Street and long for the seclusion of a pastoral setting such as the isle. The sound of water coming from a fountain in a shop window reminded Yeats of the lake that he had previously seen, and it is this inspiration that Yeats credits for the creation of the poem.
In his youth, Yeats would visit the land at Lough Gill at night, often accompanied by his cousin Henry Middleton. On one occasion, they went out onto the lake at night on a yacht to observe birds and to listen to stories by the crew. The trips that Yeats took from the streets of Sligo to the remote areas around the lake set up for him the contrasting images of the city and nature that appear in the poem's text.
Analysis分析
The twelve-line poem is divided into three quatrains and is an example of Yeats’s earlier lyric poems. Throughout the three short quatrains the poem explores the speaker’s longing for the peace and tranquility of Innisfree while residing in an urban setting. The speaker in this poem yearns to return to the island of Innisfree because of the peace and quiet it affords. He can escape the noise of the city and be lulled by the "lake water lapping with low sounds by the shore." On this small island, he can return to nature by growing beans and having bee hives, by enjoying the "purple glow" of noon, the sounds of birds' wings, and, of course, the bees. He can even build a cabin and stay on the island much as Thoreau, the American Transcendentalist, lived on Walden Pond. During his lifetime it was—to his annoyance—one of his most popular poems and on one occasion was recited (or sung) in his honor by two (or ten—accounts vary) thousand boy scouts.[5]
Musical settings音乐背景
A musical setting of this poem is featured in DUBLIN 1916, An Irish Oratorio and YEATS SONGS, a song cycle, both composed by Richard B. Evans. (published by Seacastle Music Company, 1995). Seattle, WA band Fleet Foxes mentions the Isles of Innisfree in many other songs including 'The Shrine/An Argument', 'Isles' and 'Bedouin Dress'. American composer Ben Moore has also composed a setting of the poem. Another musical setting is featured in Branduardi canta Yeats (published by Edizioni Musicali Musiza, 1986), composed and played by Angelo Branduardi on translation of Luisa Zappa. Michael McGlynn of the Irish group Anúna arranged this as a choral piece: a "recording" of it is featured on Anúna's album Invocation. Composer and pianist Ola Gjeilo set this text to music in a piece called "The Lake Isle." Popular settings of the poem have been done by Judy Collins and the Dream Brothers. Australian musician Paul Kelly performs a version on his 2013 album "Conversations with Ghosts". Shusha Guppy recorded an unaccompanied version on her album 'This is the Day' (United Artist Records, 1974).
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