William Butler Yeats was born near Dublin in 1865; and was encouraged from a young age to pursue a life in the arts. He attended art school for a short while; but soon found that his talents and interest lay in poetry rather than painting. Awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1923; Yeats produced a vast collection of stories; songs; and poetry of Irelands historical and legendary past. These writings helped secure for Yeats recognition as a leading proponent of Irish nationalism and Irish cultural independence. He received honorary degrees from Queens University (Belfast); Trinity College (Dublin); and the Universities of Oxford and Cambridge. "The Kings Threshold"; first performed by the Irish National Theatre Society in 1903; referred to an Irish tradition that dates back to the 7th-8th centuries of commoners enforcing hunger strikes against people of higher status to whom they were indebted. It told the story of a bard who undergoes a hunger strike against the king.
#3470968 in eBooks 2011-07-30 2011-07-30File Name: B005WUDL9A
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