Philosophy and a little passion: Roy Foster on WB Yeats and politics

“What if the Church and the State Are the mob that howls at the door!” With that ominous reflection, in 1934, WB Yeats signed off from one of his more controversial political involvements. This was his interest in the fascistic Blueshirt movement and his misbegotten attempt (pressurised by Ernest Blythe) to write “marching songs” for it. Although the poem Church and State suggests that he was declaring a plague on politics in general he could never quite divorce himself from the subject, especially as it concerned Ireland. Yeats’s close connection to politics comes into sharp focus as we celebrate both the 150th anniversary of his birth and the approaching centenary of the Easter Rising. He...