If a poet interprets a poem of his own he limits its suggestibility.
William Butler YeatsRead
Mere anarchy is loosed upon the world, the blood-dimmed tide is loosed, and everywhere the ceremony of innocence is drowned.
Interpretation
What this quote means
This quote reflects the chaos and loss of innocence in society amidst turmoil and violence.
William Butler Yeats' quote speaks to the deep sense of disorder and moral degradation in the world. 'Mere anarchy' suggests a breakdown of societal structures, while the 'blood-dimmed tide' evokes images of violence drowning out innocence and virtue. This vivid imagery illustrates a world where chaos reigns, and the purity of existence is overwhelmed by conflict and moral ambiguity.
Themes
ChaosInnocenceViolenceAnarchySociety
In practice
Example use cases
In a speech discussing the impact of war on communities, this quote can illustrate the consequences of neglecting societal values.
More from William Butler Yeats
All quotes βIt was my first meeting with a philosophy that confirmed my vague speculations and seemed at once logical and boundless.
William Butler YeatsRead
But I, being poor, have only my dreams; I have spread my dreams under your feet; Tread softly because you tread on my dreams.
William Butler YeatsRead
How far away the stars seem, and how far is our first kiss, and ah, how old my heart.
William Butler YeatsRead
For he would be thinking of love Till the stars had run away And the shadows eaten the moon.
William Butler YeatsRead
Love is created and preserved by intellectual analysis, for we love only that which is unique, and it belongs to contemplation, not to action, for we would not change that which we love.
William Butler YeatsRead
Similar quotes
What is life? It is the flash of a firefly in the night. It is the breath of a buffalo in the winter time. It is the little shadow which runs across the grass and loses itself in the Sunset.
CrowfootRead
When any system has for its goal the advancement of the system over the betterment of its individual members, such a system is embedded in slavery.
Gerry SpenceRead
Spiritual power is a force which history clearly teaches has been the greatest force in the development of men. Ye. we have been merely playing with it and never have really studied it as we have the physical forces. Some day people will learn that material things do not bring happiness, and are of little use in making people creative and powerful. Then the scientists of the world will turn their laboratories over to the study of spiritual forces which have hardly been scratched.
Charles Proteus SteinmetzRead
To say that truth is not out there is simply to say that where there are no sentences there is no truth, that sentences are elements of human languages, and that languages are human creations.~ The suggestion that truth~ is out there is a legacy of an age in which the world was seen as the creation of a being who had a language his own.
Richard RortyRead
Life is a mess. And theology must be lived out in the midst of that mess.
Charles ColsonRead
The whole religious complexion of the modern world is due to the absence from Jerusalem of a lunatic asylum.
Thomas PaineRead