William Butler Yeats [1865-1939] is one of Irelands most revered poets and playwrights. His work has been widely circulated and anthologised. As poetry and as song a number of his poems have been recorded and also used on radio, TV and films.
W.B.Yeats was born in Dublin Ireland on 13th June 1865, but moved to Chiswick London in 1867 due to his fathers career as a lawyer and did not return to Ireland until 1881, where he studied at the Metropolitan School of Art, it was here that he met fellow poet George Russell who shared his interest in mysticism. In 1885 Yeats had his first poems published in the Dublin University Review, in 1887 he returned with his family to Chiswick, and 1890 see him along with Ernest Rhys form the Rhymers club, a group of poets who met in Fleet street, London between 1891-1894, the line up at the start included the likes of Richard Le Gallienne, Ernest Dowson, Lionel Johnson, Arthur Symmons, John Davidson, T.W.Rolleston, Selwyn Image and Edwin Ellis. In Yeats's memoirs, Four Years:1887-1891, Yeats claimed William Watson joined but never came, Frances Thompson came once but did not join, and Oscar Wilde would only attend meetings in private houses.