When I first read Yeats' “The Rider from the North” I couldn't help but think of Harry's McClintock's “Big Rock Candy Mountain.” This sort of peasant paradise with visions of booze-floods and peaceful countryside seem is not an uncommon one, but upon further exploration “The Rider from the North” reveals itself as somewhat more complex. Reading the first refrain, I was led to believe that Yeats' fox declared “the world's bane” to be the “townland” that the rider approaches; communicating a romantic resistance to civilization and exalting the beauty of nature.

Though now it seems to me that the rider's journey is a movement through life where the 'townland' is not simply death, but a rich afterlife. Perhaps the most interesting aspect of the poem is the somewhat contradictory elements of Yeat's protestant tendencies and his fascination with fantasy and the magical. When reading of “golden and silver wood” and women “dancing in a crowd,” one almost expects to read faeries peeking out from behind them. Yet in the poem's last full stanza, Yeats invokes the images of the angels Michael and Gabriel. This is all done in a manner that seems thoroughly Irish, giving Gabriel “a fish tail” which recalls a number of Irish water spirits and chimeras.

If my reading is not entirely off-base, Yeats' second verse is rather telling of the author. He writes about a resurrection after death that men are “lucky” not to truly understand, for fear that in truly understanding the nature of death, man will not be able to live life. They might even “let the spade lie” which would certainly betray the protestant work ethic and sense of responsibility. In addition to this, there is also a sense that to realize the beauty of 'heaven' or the 'townland' or perhaps even, God, would rob the physical world of all its beauty.

Like much of In the Seven Woods, “The Rider from the North” speaks to Yeats' struggle with his own mortality and the feelings of futility in his attempt to grasp it. The fox rebukes the moon, in it's attempt to delay the inevitable in the poem's refrain, acknowledging both the terror and the beauty in the short life of the individual.

Questions:
Other than death ("The Old Men Admiring Themselves in the Water") and the struggles of the artist ("Adam's Curse") what other themes are prevalent in Seven Woods?

The final lines of "The Arrow" seems to speak to Yeats' dissatisfaction with contemporary art. How (if at all) does the rest of this poem fit into this idea?

"happy wars and sad love songs"

Growing up, my father enjoyed telling me that my family was from a place of "happy wars and sad love songs," doing some quick research now shows me that my dad failed to cite Richard Brinsley Sheridan as the author of his clever observation. Nonetheless, this often-repeated quote seems to have stuck around in my memory over the years and I was certainly reminded of it when reviewing 'A Brief History of Ireland' and trying to develop a sense of the world that Yeats inhabited.
Trying to approach Irish history from the Prehistoric Era through the modern day can be, at times, overwhelming and a brief history can often feel like a long list of invasions, occupations, and injustices. Ireland reveals itself to be a sort of capital for struggle and human tenacity. Discussed in the text and evident in Yeats' early poems, is a strong sense of nationalism and collective identity. It is interesting to consider some of the pervasive 'Irish-ness' in Yeats' "The Lake Isle of Innisfree" or "Wandering Angus" as a result of the author's encounters with John O'Leary. I am also intruiged by what is referred to as Yeat's favorite Gaelic axiom, "strife is better than loneliness." Similar to my father's favorite Sheridan quotable, the phrase speaks to the Irish urge toward progress; the 'happy war' or the 'struggle' is always preferable to the oppressive limbo that is indefinite occupation.

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