So i was brainstorming ideas to use for my first ever blog post and i kept coming back to Yeats's image of a man-headed lion rising up out of the desert. in class we were kicking around the idea that it's the sphinx and a symbol for Egypt. that could be true, but what if it's more? In the poem, the Sphinx rises up from the desert sand and stalks towards Bethlehem. I know that William Yeats was an atheist, but he had to believe that something was going on with Bethlehem because there are SOOOO many other cities he could have used. The sphinx in the Egyptian culture was a symbol of intellect and power. The fact that Yeats says it has "a gaze as blank and pitiless as the sun," makes me think that some merciless spirit, cruel and calculating, stalks toward the cradle of Christianity. Everything about the situation screams of ill intentions for little city and what might be within it, from the beast rising from the desert (a place of death and little hope) to the desert birds (which more often than not are vultures), circling around it. The title of the poem is "The Second Coming", but what is it the second coming of? Could it be the second coming of the world's attempt to snuff out Christianity at it's roots: first with Herod, and now with whatever evil spirit represented by this sphinx creature? it's seems to me that the ideas of the west-- power, intellect, cruelty- have come to finally put an end to the "old ways" of Christianity and once and for all crush it from existence. wow that last one was kinda dark....
(haha! "edit post"-- marvelous button that is..) P.S. i commented on "Yeats gives me the eats!!!"
"A shape with lion body and the head of a man...And what rough beast, its hour come round at last,Slouches towards Bethlehem to be born?" We did discuss how the beast this poem refers to is a sphinx. And following with what you said, i guess my question would be what does the last part of the poem mean?: "Slouches towards Bethlehem to be born" Why does it go to Bethlehem? Why does it say "to be born"? Is it talking about the sphinx being born again? Or is it allegorical? I like the poem but im not sure i completely understood it all. Ofcourse, we were making assumptions according to whether the beast was the sphinx.
ReplyDeleteI really like what you're saying here. At first I was thinking that the poem was talking more about a belief that Christianity has had negative effects on society. However, the idea that the poem may have been talking about an attack on Christianity is interesting. I'm not quite sure what the poem was really talking about, to be honest. I do agree, though, that the poem has some type of Christian connection even though Yeats himself was not Christian.
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