No Second Troy

Fiction | Poem | Adult | Published in 1916

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Summary

Background

Poem Analysis

Themes

Symbols & Motifs

Literary Devices

Background

Authorial Context: Yeats and Maud Gonne

William Butler Yeats often extrapolates his experiences into poetry. His poems are rarely autobiographical in a strict sense, but combine elements of personal experiences with literary history. “No Second Troy” is part of a larger suite of Yeats’s poetry that deals with his relationship with Maud Gonne (See: Further Reading & Resources). Gonne was a stern Irish nationalist and the primary recipient of Yeats’s romantic attention. Yeats proposed marriage to Gonne multiple times, and each time Gonne refused. While the basis of Gonne’s refusal changed depending on the circumstances of Yeats’s proposal, she found it hard to reconcile herself to Yeats’s inactivity in the Irish nationalist movement.

While Yeats was in support of Irish nationalism—or the burgeoning movement to liberate Ireland from English control—his support rarely extended beyond the intellectual sphere. Yeats, concerned by the threads of violence he saw in the movement, strayed from the Irish nationalist movement as he aged. This concern over the movement’s violence informs Yeats’s choice of metaphor. By comparing the movement to the Trojan War, Yeats implies it will result in a long, violent struggle like the mythological 10-year war. Gonne, meanwhile, married nationalist Major John MacBride in 1903. MacBride was later executed for his involvement in the Easter Rising of 1916—a pivotal moment for Irish independence.

Literary Context: Yeats and Classicism

Yeats’s influences range from the long-dead Romantics of the early 19th century to the Modernists of the early 20th century. Yeats was a full generation older than most of the Modernists, but Modernist poets like Ezra Pound and T. S. Eliot (who were in their early twenties when “No Second Troy” appeared), championed and influenced Yeats’s later works.

One of the major tenets of the Modernist aesthetic is to “make new.” Often, Modernist writers did this rejuvenating work by taking pieces from the literary canon and updating them to align with contemporary concerns. Homer’s Iliad and Odyssey, which chronicle the Trojan War and its aftermath, stand among the most important works in the Western literary canon. Homer’s place in the literary canon also means that his works are among the most adapted and rejuvenated by Modernist artists. Fellow Irish Modernist James Joyce wrote perhaps the most famous example of these Homeric adaptations in 1922, a novel entitled Ulysses.

By working within and revamping this shared literary history, Yeats’s “No Second Troy” places contemporary concerns equal to famous stories from Western mythology. It also elevates and grants semi-mythical status to his own doomed affair with Gonne by transforming their modern relationship into something that echoes the epic poetry of the classical past.