The Full Text of “To a Shade”
1If you have revisited the town, thin Shade,
2Whether to look upon your monument
3(I wonder if the builder has been paid)
4Or happier-thoughted when the day is spent
5To drink of that salt breath out of the sea
6When grey gulls flit about instead of men,
7And the gaunt houses put on majesty:
8Let these content you and be gone again;
9For they are at their old tricks yet.
A man
10Of your own passionate serving kind who had brought
11In his full hands what, had they only known,
12Had given their children's children loftier thought,
13Sweeter emotion, working in their veins
14Like gentle blood, has been driven from the place,
15And insult heaped upon him for his pains,
16And for his open-handedness, disgrace;
17Your enemy, an old foul mouth, had set
18The pack upon him.
Go, unquiet wanderer,
19And gather the Glasnevin coverlet
20About your head till the dust stops your ear,
21The time for you to taste of that salt breath
22And listen at the corners has not come;
23You had enough of sorrow before death—
24Away, away! You are safer in the tomb.
The Full Text of “To a Shade”
1If you have revisited the town, thin Shade,
2Whether to look upon your monument
3(I wonder if the builder has been paid)
4Or happier-thoughted when the day is spent
5To drink of that salt breath out of the sea
6When grey gulls flit about instead of men,
7And the gaunt houses put on majesty:
8Let these content you and be gone again;
9For they are at their old tricks yet.
A man
10Of your own passionate serving kind who had brought
11In his full hands what, had they only known,
12Had given their children's children loftier thought,
13Sweeter emotion, working in their veins
14Like gentle blood, has been driven from the place,
15And insult heaped upon him for his pains,
16And for his open-handedness, disgrace;
17Your enemy, an old foul mouth, had set
18The pack upon him.
Go, unquiet wanderer,
19And gather the Glasnevin coverlet
20About your head till the dust stops your ear,
21The time for you to taste of that salt breath
22And listen at the corners has not come;
23You had enough of sorrow before death—
24Away, away! You are safer in the tomb.
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“To a Shade” Introduction
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"To a Shade" is a poem from W. B. Yeats's 1916 collection Responsibilities and Other Poems (first published as Responsibilities and a Play, 1914). Written in 1913, it addresses the ghost ("Shade") of Charles Parnell (1846-1891), a famed Irish nationalist leader, while also paying tribute to Sir Hugh Percy Lane (1875-1915), a modern art gallery director whose work Yeats admired. In openly bitter tones, the speaker criticizes "the town" (Dublin, Ireland) for its closed-minded rejection of these men's political and cultural efforts. The same city that "slandered" one fine public servant, according to the speaker, has now "driven" another out of town. (Parnell was disgraced in a personal scandal; Lane failed to secure gallery funding from the city government.) Yet even in protesting that public servants are dishonored in their own time, the poem honors both of its central figures.
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“To a Shade” Summary
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If you've come back to the city of Dublin, lean ghost, to gaze on the statue they've built for you (did they pay the sculptor?), or else, in a better mood at day's end, to inhale the sea air when seagulls instead of people are out and about, and the meager homes look grand—be happy with these and get going, since the city residents are up to their old tricks.
A man as intensely public-spirited as you were—who generously tried to give them something which, if they'd only appreciated it, would have ennobled the minds and sweetened the hearts of their descendants—has been chased out of town. He's gotten only scorn for his efforts and slander for his generosity. Your old enemy, a vulgar critic, turned the common mob against him.
Get going, restless spirit. Bury yourself in the Glasnevin Cemetery ground, like a blanket, until you can't hear anything. It's not yet time for you to inhale the sea air and hover in corners, eavesdropping on the living. You experienced enough misery while you were alive. Go, go! You're better off in the grave.
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“To a Shade” Themes
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Service, Sacrifice, and Ingratitude
"To a Shade" is a bitter lament addressed to Irish nationalist leader Charles Parnell (1846-1891), who campaigned for Ireland's independence but died virtually powerless after a scandal. Addressing Parnell's ghost ("Shade"), the speaker urges him to stay in the grave rather than revisit "the town" (Dublin), because its people still fail to appreciate public servants like him. The speaker complains that Dubliners, in their continuing ingratitude, have just "driven" out another man (the art dealer Hugh Lane) who shared Parnell's "passionate" selflessness. "To a Shade" serves as an acknowledgment of these men's work and its importance while also mourning the fact that those who truly love and sacrifice for their people are rarely appreciated in their own lifetimes.
The poem laments two men who tried to perform good deeds for their people but found themselves punished rather than rewarded "for [their] pains." Though the poem never names these men, its references and context would have identified them to Yeats's readers:
- The "Shade" is Charles Parnell, an Irish nationalist leader who had died in disgrace after an adultery scandal.
- The other "man" of Parnell's "kind" is Hugh Lane, whose Municipal Gallery of Modern Art had failed to win Dublin's financial support. ("To a Shade" is one of several poems Yeats wrote about Lane and his gallery, which Yeats believed would benefit Dublin. Parnell's "monument" had recently been built in the same city, prompting Yeats to connect Parnell's failure with Lane's.)
Referring to the news about Lane, the speaker informs Parnell's ghost that "they" (the public) are still up to "their old tricks." They're again mistreating a man of Parnell's "passionate serving kind"—that is, a man who passionately worked to serve his people. The speaker tells Parnell's ghost that he and this other man share a common "enemy": the "foul mouth" of rumor-mongers and critics, who rally the people ("the pack") against noble public servants.
Public service is thankless—so thankless, the speaker implies, that public servants are better off alone in the grave than working among their people. Though Dublin has finally built Parnell a monument, the recognition has come too late, and the speaker sarcastically wonders if the statue's "builder has been paid." In other words, the town continues to snub those who work on its behalf.
The speaker thus suggests that, if Parnell's ghost visits Dublin, he'll be "happier" among its seagulls than its people—and that he'll better off leaving town quickly. In fact, the speaker advises Parnell that he'd be "safer in the tomb" than among the living. In the speaker's view, the "pains" (sacrifices) and "open-handedness" (generosity) of public servants like Parnell bring them only "insult" and "disgrace."
Ultimately, then, the poem makes a cynical statement: a political version of the idiom that "no good deed goes unpunished." At the same time, it acknowledges the worth of what public servants try to do. In particular, it honors the "loftier thought" and "Sweeter emotion" that Lane tried to bring to the public—and that the public would have appreciated, "had they only known."
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Life's Sorrows vs. Death's Serenity
"To a Shade" echoes one of the most ancient ideas in literature: that the peace of death is superior to the pain of life. The speaker portrays the living world as full of misery, conflict, and disappointment and imagines "the tomb" as a restful bed. While acknowledging that life may hold some lingering appeal for "unquiet" (restless) spirits, the poem insists that death is "safer" than the turmoil the dead have left behind.
The poem portrays life, and human society in particular, as shabby and disappointing. The speaker never actually names "the town" they're criticizing, so there's a sense that the town could stand in for human society in general. The "houses" of that town can only "put on majesty" in a certain light; they're actually "gaunt" (meager) and unimpressive. By extension, human society in general isn't all that impressive. In fact, according to the speaker, the town's "gulls" make better company than its "men." The speaker misanthropically prefers animals and nature ("the sea") to humankind. That's because the general public is merciless and ungrateful; they drag down their best servants and representatives like a "pack" of wolves.
By contrast, the poem imagines death as a rest from human folly. The speaker advises the ghost of Parnell to go back to the grave, because "You had enough of sorrow before death"—and revisiting humanity can only cause more sorrow. Referring to Glasnevin Cemetery in Dublin, the speaker tells Parnell's ghost to "gather the Glasnevin coverlet / About your head till the dust stops your ear." In other words: enjoy death as a respite from the turmoil and foolishness of human life. All in all, the speaker views death as "safer" and more peaceful than the disappointing human world.
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Line-by-Line Explanation & Analysis of “To a Shade”
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Lines 1-3
If you have revisited the town, thin Shade,
Whether to look upon your monument
(I wonder if the builder has been paid)The title "To a Shade" frames the poem as an apostrophe to a dead person. The term "shade" is often specifically associated with underworld spirits in ancient Greek and Roman myth, but it can refer to any ghost.
Lines 1-3 begin addressing this "Shade" in a fairly plain, conversational tone. The speaker calls the shade "thin," emphasizing its deprivation in the afterlife and perhaps expressing a touch of pity. The speaker then suggests that the shade might have recently "revisited the town," perhaps "to look upon your monument." Though the town and monument aren't named, these clues—along with other work Yeats was publishing at the time, and his body of work in general—start to establish a topical context for the poem.
The "Shade" is the ghost of Irish nationalist leader Charles Stewart Parnell, who had died in 1891, shortly after a scandal involving an extramarital affair caused his political downfall. Even in disgrace, Parnell remained a popular and respected leader among many Irish nationalists, and after years of fundraising, a statue honoring him (the Parnell Monument) was unveiled on O'Connell Street in Dublin in 1911. Yeats wrote "To a Shade" roughly two years later, in September 1913. The poem imagines, then, that Parnell's ghost might have left his tomb to check out the new Parnell statue.
The speaker, meanwhile, is clearly Yeats himself, who was born in a Dublin suburb and was deeply invested in all things Irish. He's considered the greatest Irish poet of his age, and in the early 20th century, his work began to incorporate more topical commentary on modern Ireland, in contrast with the mythological material that dominated the poems of his youth. He went on to write several other poems about Parnell and his legacy, including "Parnell's Funeral" (the title poem of Parnell's Funeral and Other Poems, 1935), "Come Gather Round Me Parnellites," and "Parnell."
Yeats generally admired Parnell (though his feelings varied over the years) and felt the public had judged him unfairly in the adultery scandal. To that end, "To a Shade" criticizes Dublin's ingratitude toward Parnell and public servants like him. Although the city had built Parnell a "monument," it had done so only after his disgrace and death. The snarky parenthetical in line 3—"(I wonder if the builder has been paid)"—implies that the city might even have been ungrateful and cheap enough to stiff the statue's sculptor! (The sculptor, Augustus Saint-Gaudens, was paid, but the statue was funded partly via subscriptions from Irish-American donors—in other words, Dublin didn't pay for it in full.)
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Lines 4-7
Or happier-thoughted when the day is spent
To drink of that salt breath out of the sea
When grey gulls flit about instead of men,
And the gaunt houses put on majesty: -
Lines 8-9
Let these content you and be gone again;
For they are at their old tricks yet. -
Between Lines 9-10, Lines 10-14
A man
Of your own passionate serving kind who had brought
In his full hands what, had they only known,
Had given their children's children loftier thought,
Sweeter emotion, working in their veins
Like gentle blood, has been driven from the place, -
Lines 15-18
And insult heaped upon him for his pains,
And for his open-handedness, disgrace;
Your enemy, an old foul mouth, had set
The pack upon him. -
Between Lines 18-19, Lines 19-22
Go, unquiet wanderer,
And gather the Glasnevin coverlet
About your head till the dust stops your ear,
The time for you to taste of that salt breath
And listen at the corners has not come; -
Lines 23-24
You had enough of sorrow before death—
Away, away! You are safer in the tomb.
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“To a Shade” Poetic Devices & Figurative Language
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Apostrophe
The poem consists of an apostrophe to the "Shade," or ghost, of Irish nationalist leader Charles Parnell. A ghost can't respond to the living, of course, and this ghost probably isn't meant to be literal anyway (although Yeats did believe in the supernatural!). Instead, the apostrophe is a dramatic device. Addressing the "Shade" of this dead politician allows Yeats to comment on Irish history, which seems to haunt the country's living residents.
The speaker—again, a stand-in for Yeats himself—informs Parnell's ghost that Dublin hasn't improved since he died, so he might as well stay in the grave. Specifically, the speaker compares the plight of a "man" like Parnell (a reference to the art dealer Hugh Lane) to Parnell's own plight shortly before his death. In the speaker's view, Dublin has been unfairly hostile to both of these men.
The tone of the apostrophe is complex; it's both respectful of Parnell's memory and slightly acidic or irreverent. The speaker honors Parnell (whom he didn't know personally) for being a man of the "passionate serving kind," someone genuinely dedicated to the public welfare. But he also irritably tells Parnell's ghost: "Away, away! You are safer in the tomb." This isn't a lofty address to a beloved leader; it's more an expression of impatience with the state of present-day politics.
- See where this poetic device appears in the poem.
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Metaphor
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Caesura
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Repetition
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"To a Shade" Vocabulary
Select any word below to get its definition in the context of the poem. The words are listed in the order in which they appear in the poem.
- The town
- Shade
- Your monument
- Happier-thoughted
- Gaunt
- Put on
- They/Their
- A man
- Serving
- Gentle
- Pains
- Open-handedness
- Your enemy
- Unquiet
- Glasnevin coverlet
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The city of Dublin (as indicated by the later reference to Dublin's Glasnevin Cemetery).
- See where this vocabulary word appears in the poem.
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Form, Meter, & Rhyme Scheme of “To a Shade”
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Form
Technically, "To a Shade" consists of one continuous stanza. However, it contains two dropped lines (lines 9 and 18), in which the drops and indentations function very much like stanza breaks that signal pauses and transitions in the speaker's stream of thought. At the same time, the fact that they're pauses rather than full breaks keeps the poem's momentum strong, suggesting the force of the speaker's emotion. As he criticizes the residents of Dublin and defends the legacies of Parnell and Lane, the speaker displays the kind of "passion[]" he praises in line 10.
The poem uses iambic pentameter, the most common meter in English (see Meter section for more), as well as an alternating rhyme scheme (ABABCDCD, etc.). The structure loosens at times, however, as Yeats varies the meter frequently for emphasis or musical effect, and mixes in some slant rhymes (e.g., "man"/"known") with the full rhymes. This combination of formality and looseness fits the poem well: it's a public tribute to both a leader (Parnell) and a friend (Lane), and its tone combines lofty public sentiment with irreverent complaint.
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Meter
The poem uses the most common meter in English-language poetry: iambic pentameter. This means that its lines typically contain five stressed syllables following an alternating unstressed-stressed pattern: da-DUM, da-DUM, da-DUM, da-DUM, da-DUM. Readers can hear this pattern in line 3, for example:
(I won- | der if | the buil- | der has | been paid)
Iambic pentameter is said to be the meter that most closely approximates the rhythms of natural English speech. Again, line 3 is a good example: "I wonder if the builder has been paid" is something one might say in normal conversation, but it's also a perfect pentameter line.
Like most metrical poems, however, this one contains many variations on the standard pattern. Yeats had a highly intuitive musical ear, and he was never afraid to vary a meter for emphasis or expressive effect. Listen to line 1, for instance:
If you have | revis- | ited | the town, | thin Shade,
Here, the first syllable is stressed; the words "you" and "have" basically get contracted into one unstressed syllable for metrical purposes (as if they were the contraction "you've"), and the line ends with a spondee, or a foot consisting of two stressed syllables. It therefore places the strongest emphasis on "thin Shade"—meaning the spirit of Charles Parnell, who is the poem's subject. The rhythm sounds more or less like pentameter, but it's rough, unforced, and natural. This style is well suited to a poem that addresses a countryman (or the ghost of a countryman) conversationally and irreverently.
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Rhyme Scheme
The poem rhymes on alternating lines, so its overall rhyme scheme is ABABCDCDEFEF, etc.
Most of its rhymes are exact, but it includes a few slant rhymes as well: "man"/"known," "wanderer"/"ear," "come"/"tomb." The slant rhymes introduce some looseness into an otherwise strict scheme, much as the poem's sometimes casual phrases ("I wonder if the builder has been paid," "their old tricks," "an old foul mouth," etc.) add an informal element to Yeats's formal tribute. In general, Yeats tended to mix exact rhymes with occasional slant rhymes, keeping the music of his poems flexible and slightly unpredictable rather than rigid and forced.
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“To a Shade” Speaker
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The speaker of the poem is never identified, but it's clearly W. B. Yeats. The speaker refers to himself once in the first person, in line 3, so this isn't just a generic narrative voice. More importantly, the poem addresses topical subjects that Yeats often returned to in his writing, including the controversy surrounding his friend Hugh Lane and the Municipal Gallery of Modern Art.
Yeats addressed that controversy in other poems from around the same period, including "To a Friend Whose Work Has Come to Nothing" and "To a Wealthy Man" (full title: "To a Wealthy Man Who Promised a Second Subscription to the Dublin Municipal Gallery If It Were Proved the People Wanted Pictures"). Toward the end of his career, he returned to the subject in the poem "The Municipal Gallery Revisited." He also wrote about Charles Parnell on other occasions, including in the poem "Parnell's Funeral."
In other words, "To a Shade" shows Yeats in full public-poet mode, speaking as himself on the topical events of his day.
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“To a Shade” Setting
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The poem is set in an unnamed "town" (line 1). As the detail about "Glasnevin" Cemetery (lines 19-20) reveals, this town is the city of Dublin. Yeats was born in a Dublin suburb (Sandymount), so he's pretty much describing his hometown. Dublin is also the capital of Ireland, and it's located on the country's eastern coast; hence the speaker's references to the "sea," the "gulls," and the "salt breath" of the air.
The poem reflects Yeats's mixed, sometimes antagonistic feelings toward Dublin. On the one hand, he was deeply invested in Irish history, culture, and politics, so the city was the center of his cultural universe. (Though he also spent much of his life in London.) On the other hand, he was sharply critical of what he perceived as the city's provincialism and hypocrisy.
"To a Shade" takes several jabs at the city's government and people—the unnamed "they" who are up to "their old tricks yet" (line 9). The poem suggests that both Charles Parnell and Hugh Lane were too good for their city—perhaps even their country. Dublin needed them, the speaker implies, but it didn't deserve them. Worse, it cruelly rejected them in spite of their "passionate" public service (line 10). It hounded them like a "pack" of animals, repaying their good works with "insult" and "disgrace" rather than gratitude (lines 15-18). In this hostile environment, the speaker advises, the "safe[st]" place for Parnell's ghost is Glasnevin Cemetery. (At least for now: the speaker suggests that a more hospitable "time" might "come" in the future.)
Smaller details reflect the speaker's antagonism, too. Line 7 describes the city's "gaunt houses" as merely "put[ting] on majesty" at sunset; in other words, they may look noble in a certain light, but they're actually shabby. (By extension, the line implies that the city's character is shabby.) The speaker also wistfully mentions the "loftier thought" and "Sweeter emotion" Lane tried and failed to bring to the city. This implies that Dublin is something of a backwater and could've used the extra refinement!
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Literary and Historical Context of “To a Shade”
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Literary Context
W. B. Yeats is generally considered the most influential Irish poet in modern history. He was the central figure of the Irish Literary Revival, a.k.a. the Celtic Twilight, a movement that brought renewed attention to Ireland's literature, culture, and Gaelic heritage during the late 19th and early 20th centuries. During this time, Yeats based many notable works on Irish and Celtic myth and legend, including his epic poem The Wanderings of Oisin (1889) and his play The Countess Kathleen (1892).
"To a Shade," meanwhile, appears in Yeats's 1916 collection Responsibilities and Other Poems, which was originally published in 1914 as Responsibilities and a Play. Responsibilities falls in what's known as Yeats's "middle period," a phase of his career when he began to trade the more antique diction and myth-heavy content of his previous books for a simpler, modern style. (In the poem "A Coat," from the same collection, he famously imagines his previous style as a coat he's cast off for good.)
The style of "To a Shade" also reflects the broader literary era in which it was written. Starting in the first decade of the 1900s, many English-language poets began abandoning traditional meter and rhyme in favor of free verse and other experimental techniques. Many also began using more colloquial diction and focusing on the images and conflicts of 20th-century life. These new approaches helped define what is now called "modernist" poetry.
"To a Shade" uses meter and rhyme (as Yeats would do throughout his career), but its diction and phrasing are fairly relaxed and colloquial compared to early Yeats. While it contains some stylized, "poetic" phrases such as "happier-thoughted" (line 4), it also contains blunt statements such as "I wonder if the builder has been paid" (line 3). It's a poem about current events in Ireland, as opposed to, say, a subject from Irish mythology (as many early Yeats poems were). At the same time, its speaker sounds a bit wary of modernity; he certainly doesn't consider it a revolutionary improvement on the past (see "they are at their old tricks yet," line 9).
In some ways, then, "To a Shade" reads like a poem of the late Romantic period (the era of English-language poetry stretching from the mid-1800s through the early 1900s). In others, it seems to anticipate the changes of modernism. Not coincidentally, its topical subject and cultural references also bridge the late 19th and early 20th centuries.
Historical Context
The Irish Literary Revival developed during a tumultuous period in Ireland. It was associated with the Irish nationalist movement that sought self-government for Ireland, first within the United Kingdom and later outside it. Through a combination of literature and activism, the writers of this movement hoped to raise Irish national consciousness—that is, encourage Ireland to see itself as a cohesive, potentially self-governing people with a rich cultural tradition.
Yeasts wrote "To a Shade" during this tumultuous time, a few years before the 1916 Easter Rising (an insurrection against British rule, which he commemorated in his famous poem "Easter, 1916") and less than a decade before the establishment of the Irish Free State. Dated September 29, 1913, "To a Shade" addresses the ghost of Charles Stewart Parnell (1846-1891), a popular Irish nationalist and Member of Parliament whose career was damaged by a scandal involving an extramarital affair. The poem defends Parnell's legacy, as well as the work of Sir Hugh Percy Lane (1875-1915), whose passion for public service Yeats compares to Parnell's.
Lane was a modern art dealer known for collecting works by French Impressionists, including Claude Monet and Pierre-Auguste Renoir. He founded the Municipal Gallery of Modern Art in Dublin in 1908, but when he failed to secure the financial support of the Dublin Corporation (the city government), the project foundered. As The Guardian explains:
[W]hen Lane and various well-connected people agitated for money to purchase modern paintings and a building to put them in, there was a predictable groundswell against them: modern art was described as a luxury in a city that needed root-and-branch social reform. And [...] a flavour of libertinism and license also attached to the new painting (as was often mentioned disapprovingly in relation to Renoir’s buxom girls in the arms of burly workmen). [...] Yeats's pugnacious public poems did little to help. When, in 1913, Lane’s preferred plans [...] were turned down, and after debates in the Corporation turned nasty, he offered 39 modern paintings to the National Gallery in London. The London Gallery accepted them, though on the understanding that they wouldn’t immediately exhibit them.
Basically, Yeats felt that the narrow-mindedness of Dublin's leaders and citizens had spoiled Lane's work, just as it had wrecked Parnell's career a generation before. He strongly believed that Lane's gallery would enhance Ireland's culture—the "thought" and "emotion" of his people (lines 12-14)—yet his spirited public defenses of Lane inflamed the controversy further.
Lane died in the famous sinking of the Lusitania in 1915, so by the time Responsibilities and Other Poems was published, "To a Shade" had become a tribute to two dead men. Lane's will left the 39 modern paintings to Dublin after all, but a legal controversy initially kept their status in limbo. For many years, the paintings alternated between London and Dublin, but they're now permanently located in the latter city. Lane's Municipal Gallery ultimately found a permanent home, too—in Parnell Square, Dublin.
Toward the end of his life, Yeats wrote another well-known reflection on Lane and his gallery: "The Municipal Gallery Revisited." He also wrote several more poems about Parnell, including "Parnell's Funeral" (title poem of Parnell's Funeral and Other Poems, 1935), and "Come Gather Round Me Parnellites" and "Parnell" (both from New Poems, 1938).
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More “To a Shade” Resources
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External Resources
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Responsibilities and Other Poems — Browse the 1916 collection in which "To a Shade" appeared.
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More on Parnell — Read about the life of Charles Stewart Parnell, the Irish leader elegized in "To a Shade."
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More on Sir Hugh Lane — Read about Sir Hugh Percy Lane and the controversy over his Municipal Gallery, which Yeats alludes to in "To a Shade."
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The Poet's Life and Work — Read a short biography of Yeats at the Poetry Foundation.
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Yeats, Nobel Laureate — More facts about Yeats, along with his Nobel Prize citation, at Nobelprize.org.
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Yeats's Note on the Poem — Read Yeats's own explanation of his defense of Hugh Lane and Charles Parnell, printed in an author's note in the 1916 edition of Responsibilities.
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LitCharts on Other Poems by William Butler Yeats
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