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“Lapis Lazuli” Introduction
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Written in 1938, a year of ominous upheaval in Europe, W. B. Yeats's "Lapis Lazuli" meditates on the rise and fall of civilizations and the redemptive role of the artist in society. As war looms on the horizon, the speaker mocks "hysterical" people who treat art as irrelevant—or even irresponsible in times of crisis. The speaker insists that artists' "Gaiety," or creative exuberance, "transfigur[es]" the horror of mass violence, just as Shakespearean heroes' vitality takes the edge off their individual tragedies. The speaker also points out that many civilizations have collapsed throughout history and that artists always come along to help rebuild. Expanding on these ideas, the speaker describes a carved "Lapis Lazuli" stone depicting three men and a bird, "a symbol of longevity." The speaker treats the carving itself as proof of art's longevity, and of the broader perspective it offers on history's "tragic scene." "Lapis Lazuli" appears in New Poems (1938), the last collection Yeats published before his death in 1939—which was also the year World War II broke out.
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“Lapis Lazuli” Summary
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I'm told that panicked women are saying they're tired of art, music, and poets who always stay exuberant. These women say we all know, or ought to know, that unless extreme measures are taken, warplanes and airships will bomb our city to the ground, like King William III firing artillery at the Irish in 1690.
Everyone has a tragic role to play in the world. There's Shakespeare's swaggering Prince Hamlet (or someone who resembles him); there's Shakespeare's King Lear; there are Ophelia and Cordelia (heroines from Hamlet and King Lear). If they're about to die—if the curtain's about to go down on them—and they deserve their tragic role, they don't burst into tears mid-speech. They know that Hamlet and Lear, though tragic heroes, are exuberant; exuberance is what transforms and redeems their dreadful tragedies. Everyone aspires to, attains, and loses things; everyone blacks out and dies with the light of heaven filling their heads—this is tragedy at its maximum. Even if Hamlet chatters and Lear rants, and the curtains drop on 100,000 stages at the same time (100,000 people die at once), tragedy can't grow to any greater proportions.
They arrived by foot, ship, camel, horse, or mule: ancient civilizations that have since been conquered. Their culture and learning were destroyed along with them. There are no surviving works by the ancient Greek sculptor Callimachus, who made marble seem as easy to sculpt as bronze, and made sculptures of fabric that seemed lifted by a sea-breeze at the corner. The lamp chimney he made, which was as long and thin as a palm trunk, is also gone; it might as well have disappeared after a day. Everything gets destroyed and rebuilt, and it's the exuberant people who rebuild.
A carved lapis lazuli stone shows two Chinese men with a third following behind. Above them soars a bird with long legs (i.e., a crane), which represents longevity. The third man, no doubt a servant, has brought an instrument to play.
Each mark, rift, or pit in the stone looks like a stream or an avalanche, or a mountainside where it's still snowing—although plum or cherry boughs are blossoming, no doubt, around the little shelter the three men are climbing toward. It makes me happy to picture them sitting there, looking out at mountain, sky, and the whole tragic scene of earth. One of them asks for sad music, and the third man's skillful fingers start to play his instrument. The men's eyes—old, gleaming, and surrounded by wrinkles—are exuberant.
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“Lapis Lazuli” Themes
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Tragedy and Joy
W. B. Yeats's "Lapis Lazuli" is a sweeping meditation on human tragedy, including the looming disasters of the pre-World War II period. By contrast with those who panic and insist on a somber, practical response to tragedy, the speaker praises "Gaiety" or exuberance under tragic circumstances. Even in the darkest of historical periods, the poem encourages taking a long, serene, and even optimistic view of human affairs.
The poem suggests that tragedy is a natural, unchanging part of history and the human experience. Human sorrow, the speaker claims, remains basically constant from era to era. "All men" throughout history "have aimed at, found and lost"; this is "Tragedy wrought to its uttermost." In other words, human life doesn't get more tragic just because a particular war starts or new killing machines are invented. Tragedy doesn't even fundamentally change when death tolls soar, as in modern warfare. The speaker claims that even if 100,000 people die simultaneously—if metaphorical curtains "drop at once / Upon a hundred thousand stages"—human sorrow "cannot grow by an inch or an ounce." The speaker implies, here, that individuals experience only their own suffering, not everyone else's: no one plays all the tragic roles at once. Moreover, the speaker points out that mass destruction is nothing new. "Old civilisations" have died in many ways, and it's joyously creative types—not panicky, somber, or fatalistic people—who have built new things from the rubble.
Indeed, the poem mocks people who panic in the face of looming disaster, including war. In particular, the speaker laughs at "women" who have grown "hysterical" and moralistic during the crises of the 1930s. These women accuse artists of self-indulgence—of pursuing irrelevant work rather than fulfilling their social and political duties. These critics are offended more by the artists' attitude than the art itself. They "are sick [...] Of poets who are always gay"—that is, who remain exuberant and creatively productive, even when an enemy is about to "bomb[]" their country.
By contrast, the speaker praises people who maintain joy in the face of tragedy. For example, he claims that Shakespeare's tragic heroes and heroines embody this attitude, despite their occasional "rambl[ing]" and "rag[ing]." These characters are heroic—"worthy" of their starring role "in the play"—because they do not grow hysterical and "break up their lines to weep." Even at the peak of their passion, they maintain a certain eloquence and "Gaiety," like writers and artists. Similarly, the speaker celebrates the ancient Greek sculptor Callimachus, who took extreme care with art that has largely been lost to history. The speaker suggests that his sculptures were worth making anyway; similarly, life is worth living fully and joyously, even when disaster is approaching.
Finally, the figures on the speaker's stone carving (the "Lapis Lazuli" of the title) embody the same attitude. The speaker imagines them looking over the whole "tragic scene" of humanity, but maintaining a calm, cheerful mood rather than wallowing or panicking. One of them turns the human tragedy into "mournful melodies"—and the others enjoy the music. The poem equates this kind of serene, joyful, creative outlook with true wisdom.
Where this theme appears in the poem:- Lines 1-56
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The Redemptive Power of Art
The speaker of "Lapis Lazuli" sees artistic creativity as a central and redemptive part of the human experience. In fact, the poem suggests that the endless creativity of artists helps humanity keep going, even after the deaths of entire cultures. In this view, great art both emerges from and teaches the qualities necessary for human persistence, including the calm recognition that all things pass.
The poem vindicates the power and necessity of art against those who scorn it as useless and frivolous. The speaker disdains "women" in his society who are "sick of" artists and their creative joy. These women seem to feel that a society under threat of war needs "drastic" action rather than the peaceful escapism of art. With reference to Shakespeare, the speaker suggests that the "Gaiety" of artists, and even their fictional characters, does something essential. It "transfigur[es]" the "dread" humanity feels while under threat, making life worthwhile even under the most tragic conditions.
The speaker also pays homage to the ancient Greek sculptor Callimachus, who "handled marble" with incredible finesse. None of Callimachus's art survived the death of his civilization, according to the speaker. Even his famous "lamp" (once a symbol of endurance, because it only needed refilling once a year) has burned out and vanished. Yet the poem shows how the memory of Callimachus's spirit endures, inspiring a poet whose own civilization is teetering on the brink.
Refusing to mourn the lost art and culture of the past, the speaker proclaims that "All things fall and are built again, / And those who build them again are gay." To the speaker, then, art both manifests and encourages the kind of inventive, cheerful persistence that humanity has so often needed throughout history. Artists themselves not only help build their civilizations but rebuild in the face of loss. Those who wield the "palette," "fiddle-bow," and pen are not shirking some higher duty, even in wartime: they are doing essential work. Like the bird on the speaker's lapis lazuli carving, art is both "a symbol of longevity" and a lesson in survival over time.
Where this theme appears in the poem:- Lines 1-56
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The Death and Birth of Civilizations
Written during a time of mass turmoil in Europe, "Lapis Lazuli" contemplates the death and birth of civilizations in general. The poem takes a broad and serene perspective, noting that great civilizations have risen and fallen many times before; they're part of a natural cycle of creation and destruction, like the cycle of life. "All things fall and are built again," the speaker says, implying that even if modern Europe (or the modern world in general) collapses, something else will come to take its place. In taking this stance, the speaker seeks the kind of elevated viewpoint portrayed in their "Lapis Lazuli" carving, which features men cheerfully gazing from a mountaintop on the whole "tragic scene" of humanity.
The poem contemplates the potential destruction of the poet's own civilization, juxtaposing this possibility with similar events from the past. Writing in pre-WWII Europe (1938), the poet lightly and even mockingly anticipates the aerial bombardments of war. He does not dismiss the prediction of "hysterical women" that warplanes may soon destroy whole cities: "Pitch like King Billy bomb-balls in / Until the town lie beaten flat." Here, "King Billy” alludes to William III of England (1605-1702), who used artillery against Yeats's native Ireland, but it also invokes Kaiser Wilhem II, whose planes and airships ("Zeppelin[s]") bombed the UK during World War I. In other words, the allusion points toward both older and more recent examples of mass violence, suggesting that such violence is a constant throughout history.
From there, the speaker ponders the many "Old civilisations" who were "put to the sword," or conquered. After their defeat, "[these cultures] and their wisdom went to rack," meaning ruin. Yet according to the speaker, this kind of devastating loss is just a temporary setback in the grand historical scheme of things.
The poem indicates that while civilizations and their monuments sometimes die, new ones rise from the ashes, in an endlessly replenishing cycle. The speaker jauntily shrugs, "All things fall and are built again / And those that build them again are gay." In other words, cultures die and are born anew in, and optimistic exuberance is what fuels the rebuilding. These lines serve as a kind of thesis statement for the poem: they acknowledge the inevitability of mass destruction, but also creation in the wake of destruction.
The poem ends by celebrating a "Lapis Lazuli" carving that seems to sum up the speaker's view of history. This carving is an artifact from China: one of the world's most ancient civilizations, and one that has seen plenty of destruction and renewal over the millennia. The figures on the carving—two gentlemen and a musician/servant—climb a mountain slope. The poet imagines them reaching a house on the mountain and gazing on "all the tragic scene" of humanity, while the musician plays a "mournful" yet pleasing tune. In this way, they seem to attain a lofty, god's-eye view of human affairs. They are able to separate themselves from the tragedy of history; the artist is even able to make something redemptive from it (music).
Ultimately, the poem seeks the same detached perspective on human turmoil, suggesting that this perspective can ward off "hysteri[a]" even amid a threatened or dying civilization.
Where this theme appears in the poem:- Lines 1-8
- Lines 25-56
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Line-by-Line Explanation & Analysis of “Lapis Lazuli”
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Before Line 1, Lines 1-3
(for Harry Clifton) ...
... are always gay,"Lapis Lazuli" begins with a dedication: "for Harry Clifton." Together, the title and dedication point to the poem's backstory:
- In 1935, Clifton, a young aspiring poet, sent W. B. Yeats a lapis lazuli carving as a 70th birthday gift. (Lapis lazuli is a blue semi-precious stone often used in antique art and jewelry.)
- To Yeats, the carving seemed to exemplify what he variously called "heroic discipline," "heroic ecstasy," and "the heroic cry in the midst of despair." It inspired him to write the poem as a kind of return gift to Clifton—though the poem doesn't start to describe the carving until line 37.
Instead, the speaker (a stand-in for the poet) begins by commenting on the political world around him. The poem dates to 1938, the year before the outbreak of World War II—a time when fascism was spreading through Europe and mass violence was gathering ominously on the horizon. (Civil war was already raging in Spain.) Faced with the likelihood of a second world war in three decades, European civilization, if not human civilization, was in crisis mode.
Amid this crisis, the speaker observes that art, music, and poetry—as well as the people who make them—have become politically unpopular in some quarters. He describes the problem in lines that are themselves highly musical, full of swinging rhythm and alliteration:
I have heard that hysterical women say
They are sick of the palette and fiddle-bow,
Of poets that are always gay,With a tinge of misogyny (not unusual for Yeats!), the speaker mocks "hysterical women" for taking out their fear on artists. These disapproving ladies, panicked by the threat of war, declare that they're tired of "the palette and fiddle-bow"—metonyms for art and music in general—as well as "poets" whose mood is "always gay." Here and throughout the poem, "gay" means exuberant or cheerful, not homosexual (this definition of the word wouldn't enter the mainstream until decades after Yeats died). Arguably, Yeats is also putting his own unusual spin on the word: he's using it to connote a kind of creative exuberance, or the joyous energy that goes into making art.
Such exuberance repels the "women," who clearly feel that it's inappropriate and unhelpful in times of crisis. As one of the "poets" they're scolding, Yeats disagrees—and uses the rest of the poem to defend his stance.
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Lines 4-8
For everybody knows ...
... lie beaten flat.
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Lines 9-11
All perform their ...
... Ophelia, that Cordelia; -
Lines 12-17
Yet they, should ...
... all that dread. -
Lines 18-24
All men have ...
... or an ounce. -
Lines 25-28
On their own ...
... went to rack: -
Lines 29-34
No handiwork of ...
... but a day; -
Lines 35-36
All things fall ...
... again are gay. -
Lines 37-42
Two Chinamen, behind ...
... a musical instrument. -
Lines 43-49
Every discolouration of ...
... Chinamen climb towards, -
Lines 49-56
and I ...
... eyes, are gay.
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“Lapis Lazuli” Symbols
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Callimachus's Lamp
The "long lamp chimney" mentioned in lines 33-34 was once a real object—at least, if ancient sources are any guide. The ancient Greek sculptor Callimachus was said to have crafted a golden lamp whose oil needed to be refilled only once a year. Smoke from the lamp rose through a "chimney shaped like the stem" of a "palm" tree and was trapped by a sculpted bronze palm branch above. The lamp hung in the Temple of Athena, but along with Callimachus's other work, it has been lost.
In its heyday, then, the lamp was a "symbol of longevity," like the bird in lines 39-40. Its asbestos wick made it burn much longer than other lamps of the time. In the poem, by contrast, it symbolizes the brevity of even the most permanent-seeming things. The lamp "stood but a day" in the grand scheme of history, and then it vanished. The poem acknowledges that all the products of civilization—and even "civilisations" themselves—are similarly temporary. Even artworks and cultures that seem immortal die out eventually: "All things fall and are built again" (line 35).
Where this symbol appears in the poem:- Lines 33-34: “His long lamp chimney shaped like the stem / Of a slender palm, stood but a day;”
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The Carving
The scene "carved in Lapis Lazuli" is a complex symbol. Broadly, like the bird it depicts, the carving can be read as a "symbol of longevity"—and of an attitude that Yeats believes transcends any one era.
Lapis lazuli is a type of bright blue semi-precious stone often used in jewelry, carvings, and the like. The carving in the poem is based on one that the younger poet Harry Clifton (mentioned in the dedication) had sent Yeats as a birthday gift. The actual carving portrays what Yeats initially described as "a mountain with temple, trees, paths and an ascetic and pupil about to climb the mountain." These two climbers are accompanied by a third man, whom the poem interprets as "a serving-man" and who "Carries a musical instrument": a ch'in [qin] or lute. The real carving also shows pine trees and a crane. The poem changes a couple of details, switching pine to "plum or cherry-branch" and the temple to a "little half-way house" on the mountain. For the most part, though, the poem describes the real carving faithfully.
Yeats then interprets the scene as an image of stoic "Gaiety" and lofty remove from earthly affairs. He imagines that the third man will play music for the other two and that the group will "stare" down calmly at "all the tragic scene" of humanity. Though the music will be "mournful," the listeners' eyes will remain "gay" (as in cheerful). For Yeats, the scene represents the kind of elevated, detached, unflappably positive attitude great artists take toward the world—the attitude he believes is best in times of crisis.
Where this symbol appears in the poem:- Lines 37-56: “Two Chinamen, behind them a third, / Are carved in Lapis Lazuli, / Over them flies a long-legged bird / A symbol of longevity; / The third, doubtless a serving-man, / Carries a musical instrument. / Every discolouration of the stone, / Every accidental crack or dent / Seems a water-course or an avalanche, / Or lofty slope where it still snows / Though doubtless plum or cherry-branch / Sweetens the little half-way house / Those Chinamen climb towards, and I / Delight to imagine them seated there; / There, on the mountain and the sky, / On all the tragic scene they stare. / One asks for mournful melodies; / Accomplished fingers begin to play. / Their eyes mid many wrinkles, their eyes, / Their ancient, glittering eyes, are gay.”
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“Lapis Lazuli” Poetic Devices & Figurative Language
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Juxtaposition
"Lapis Lazuli" consists of a series of juxtapositions, through which the speaker presents and illustrates his ideas about tragedy and art. The poem brings together a number of settings for the implied purpose of comparison:
- Yeats's own pre-World War II Europe;
- The world of Shakespeare's tragedies;
- "Old civilisations" (particularly ancient Greece);
- And the scene carved on the "Lapis Lazuli" stone (which the speaker fleshes out in his imagination).
This approach allows the speaker to advance his argument briskly, through implication and vivid examples, rather than spelling out every step in his thought process.
The thread uniting all these settings is the theme of "Gaiety." Here's how this plays out from stanza to stanza:
- Stanza 1: When civilization is in crisis, fearful people criticize artists for their gaiety: that is, for their creative exuberance, which seems inappropriate and impractical.
- Stanza 2: In Shakespearean plays, the heroes' gaiety is what helps redeem their dreadful tragedies. (So gaiety does serve a practical purpose, in both art and life.)
- Stanza 3: Civilizations rise and fall all the time. Artists and creative types, in all their gaiety, are the people who rebuild from the ruins. (So, once again, gaiety is constructive.)
- Stanzas 4-5: The carved stone shows three men making and enjoying art high above the "tragic scene" of the world. (So the men, along with the carving itself, exemplify the kind of gaiety the poem supports.)
Again, the poem states some of its claims outright but leaves the reader to infer the rest. The collage of scenes adds up to a coherent (though debatable) argument; the whole is greater than the sum of its juxtaposed parts.
Where juxtaposition appears in the poem:- Lines 1-56
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Allusion
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Repetition
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Alliteration
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Simile
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Metaphor
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“Lapis Lazuli” 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.
- Hysterical
- Palette
- Fiddle-bow
- Gay/Gaiety
- Drastic
- Aeroplane and Zeppelin
- King Billy
- Bomb-balls
- Hamlet, Lear, Ophelia, Cordelia
- Prominent part
- Transfiguring
- Wrought
- Uttermost
- Drop scenes
- On shipboard
- Camel-back, horse-back, ass-back, mule-back
- Went to rack
- Handiwork
- Callimachus
- Draperies
- Lamp chimney
- Lapis Lazuli
- Longevity
- Serving-man
- Discolouration
- Water-course
- Plum or cherry-branch
- Half-way house
- Mid
Hysterical-
(Location in poem: Line 1: “I have heard that hysterical women say”)
Panicked; overwrought.
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Form, Meter, & Rhyme Scheme of “Lapis Lazuli”
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Form
"Lapis Lazuli" contains five stanzas of varying length. These are prefaced by a dedication to Harry Clifton: the young poet who gave Yeats the "carved [...] Lapis Lazuli" stone for his 70th birthday.
The poem rhymes on alternating lines (making its rhyme scheme ABABCDCD, etc.), though many of its rhymes are slant (e.g., "done"/"in") rather than exact. It uses a loose four-beat accentual meter, meaning that nearly all of its lines contain four stressed syllables, but the number of syllables per line varies.
As a result of all these features, the poem sounds quite musical, but the music has a loose, almost jaunty swing to it. This jaunty sound reflects the "Gaiety" (cheerfulness or exuberance) the poet celebrates. Indeed, the poem ends four of its lines and two of its stanzas with the word "gay" (as in cheerful/exuberant, the noun form of "gaiety"), making the word similar to a refrain. Gaiety is the quality that Yeats believes great artists have, and that people in general should embrace under tragic circumstances, so it's no surprise that he tries to capture it through his poem's form.
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Meter
The poem uses a rough four-beat accentual meter. Nearly all of its lines contain four stressed syllables, but the placement of these stresses varies, as does the syllable count per line. Notice, for example, the difference between line 9 and line 25. One contains seven syllables, the other ten, but both have four strong stresses:
All perform their tragic play,
[...]
On their own feet they came, or on shipboard,
This looseness gives the poem an almost cheerful, swinging rhythm, which captures the mood the speaker describes: "Gaiety" in the face of "dread."
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Rhyme Scheme
The poem rhymes on alternating lines, so its rhyme scheme is ABABCDCD, etc.
Some of its rhymes are exact (e.g., "say"/"gay"), but many are slant or imperfect (e.g., "done"/"in," "out"/"flat"). "Gay" repeats as a rhyme word four times over (lines 3, 16, 36, and 56); in two of those cases, it rhymes with "play" (lines 14 and 54). The playful looseness of the rhyming, combined with the emphasis on gaiety and play in general, helps capture the kind of resilient joy the poem advocates.
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“Lapis Lazuli” Speaker
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The speaker of the poem is unnamed, ungendered, etc., but it's fair to read him as Yeats himself. The poem describes a real-life gift Yeats received from Harry Clifton (the poem's dedicatee): a lapis lazuli stone carved with the scene described in lines 37-56 ("Two Chinamen, behind them a third, [...] Their ancient, glittering eyes, are gay."). The sentiments in the poem clearly derive from a letter Yeats wrote to a friend, the duchess and socialite Dorothy Wellesley, in which he describes and interprets the carving. The passage about "Hamlet," "Lear," etc. also has parallels with an essay from Yeats's book On the Boiler, written around the same time. Due to the close resemblance between poet and speaker, this guide refers to the speaker as "he" or "Yeats."
As a character in the poem, the speaker generally comes off as learned, serene, and upbeat. He is clearly striving for the "Gaiety" he associates with great artists and Shakespearean heroes. His reference to "hysterical women" sounds misogynistic to modern ears (not a first for Yeats), and he is keen to defend the honor of "poets" and artists (no surprise, coming from a poet). His appreciation for the wisdom of the elderly—the "ancient" men described at the end—may relate to his own age; he wrote "Lapis Lazuli" at age 72, the year before he died.
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“Lapis Lazuli” Setting
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The poem was written in Europe on the cusp of World War II. Its setting seems to reflect that context: the speaker describes "hysterical women" who fear that "Aeroplane[s]" and "Zeppelin[s]" will soon "bomb[]" their "town" to rubble.
The fear of "Zeppelin[s]" alone basically pinpoints the time and place as interwar Europe. Zeppelins had played a high-profile (though not especially deadly) role in World War I, as Germany used them for bombing runs on the UK and other nations. Largely outmoded as military aircraft by 1939, they did not end up playing a major role in the European theater of WWII (though the U.S. used some for patrol, convoy, and search-and-rescue operations along its own coasts). On the other hand, "Aeroplanes" (airplanes) would indeed bomb many cities during the Second World War, doing far more damage than they had in the First.
The casual allusion to "King Billy" and his "bomb-balls"—that is, King William III, who attacked the Irish with artillery at the 1690 Battle of the Boyne—seems to narrow down the location to Yeats's native Ireland.
The poem also gestures toward "Old civilisations" around the world, with implied references to ancient Greece (home of "Callimachus") and "China[]." The "lamp" mentioned in lines 33-34 once hung in the Temple of Athena Polias in Athens, Greece. The setting described in lines 37-56 ("Two Chinamen, behind them a third, [...] Their ancient, glittering eyes, are gay.") is, of course, imagined (it's the scene carved on the stone), though it clearly represents a "mountain" somewhere in China.
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Literary and Historical Context of “Lapis Lazuli”
Literary Context
"Lapis Lazuli" is a late poem by the celebrated Irish poet William Butler Yeats (1865-1939), widely considered the most influential Irish poet in modern history. Yeats was integral to 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.
"Lapis Lazuli" was published in The London Mercury in March 1938 and collected later that spring in New Poems, the last book Yeats published in his lifetime. The poem originated with a 70th-birthday gift Yeats received from an aspiring poet, Harry Clifton (to whom "Lapis Lazuli" is dedicated). Clifton sent the elder poet a lapis lazuli stone carved by a Chinese sculptor. According to at least one scholar, the carving depicts two ancient wisemen (two of the "Eight Immortals" of Chinese legend) and one of the mythical Chinese Isles of the Blessed, which were said to contain plants and waters that could restore youth and prolong life.
In a subsequent letter to a friend, Yeats mentioned the sculpture and linked it with what he called "heroic ecstasy" or "heroic discipline." He declared that "the true poetic movement of our time" strove toward this quality, which he illustrated by alluding to lines from "Villanelle of the Poet's Road," by Ernest Dowson:
Unto us they belong,
Us the bitter and gay,
Wine and women and song.He also commented further on the sculpture itself, adding a few sweeping generalizations about "east[ern]" cultures such as China:
[S]omeone has sent me a present of a great piece carved by some Chinese sculptor into the semblance of a mountain with temple, trees, paths and an ascetic and pupil about to climb the mountain. Ascetic, pupil, hard stone, eternal theme of the sensual east. The heroic cry in the midst of despair. But no, I am wrong, the east has its solutions always and therefore knows nothing of tragedy. It is we, not the east, that must raise the heroic cry.
These details are incomplete and partly inaccurate, but by the time he finished the poem, Yeats had largely corrected them (e.g., the structure on the mountain is indeed a "half-way house," not a temple). "Lapis Lazuli" became Yeats's own illustration of the sculpture's "heroic" quality—its combination of stoicism and "Gaiety." An essay from his book On the Boiler, completed around the same time, explores similar themes, discussing "tragedy" and "joy" with reference to Shakespeare's "Hamlet," "Lear," "Ophelia," etc.
Historical Context
Yeats was a prominent public figure, the first Irishman to win the Nobel Prize for Literature and a member of the Irish Senate during the 1920s. His work was a key part of Ireland's push for political and cultural autonomy. His patriotism heavily informed his early and mid-career poetry, much of which is overtly political. "Easter, 1916," for example, was his response to an (ultimately unsuccessful) Irish uprising against British rule.
By the time Yeats published "Lapis Lazuli" in 1938, he had largely transitioned away from political poetry into a more mystical style, exemplified by works like "Byzantium" and "Sailing to Byzantium." These are soul-searching poems of artistic transcendence and heavenly perfection—themes that aren't attached to any particular time, place, or event. However, even this unearthly idealism had some unsavory political implications: preferring grand national mythologies and overarching philosophical systems to individualistic democracy, Yeats sympathized with the rising fascist governments of the early 20th century.
At the same time, as "Lapis Lazuli" shows, he saw a role for artists that transcended ideology. He viewed artists as exuberant, "heroic" civilization-builders within the never-ending cycle of human history: "All things fall and are built again / And those that build them again are gay." This poem suggests, then, that even if "Aeroplane[s] and Zeppelin[s]" bomb European cities—as in World War I—there's no need to get "hysterical": humanity will survive, and artists will help rebuild.
Indeed, though Yeats didn't live to see it, the Second World War broke out the following year, when Nazi Germany invaded Poland in September 1939. Though the invasion was shocking, flouting the 1938 Munich Agreement that had sought to contain Germany's territorial expansion, the war itself was not particularly surprising to many observers of the time. The conflict between fascist and left-wing/democratic forces had already sparked the Spanish Civil War (1936-1939), and the aggression of fascist dictators, particularly Germany's Adolf Hitler, had already embroiled Europe in an intense diplomatic crisis. Ultimately, WWII became a conflict spanning multiple continents; by the war's conclusion, 40 to 60 million people had died.
The poem also gestures toward the rise and fall of "civilisations" throughout history. These include ancient Greece—which produced many famous thinkers and artists, including the sculptor "Callimachus" (5th century BCE)—and "ancient" and modern China, which has gone through countless political transformations and produced countless works of lasting art.
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More “Lapis Lazuli” Resources
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External Resources
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The Poem Aloud — Listen to a reading of Yeats's "Lapis Lazuli" by another famous 20th-century poet: Dylan Thomas.
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The Lapis Lazuli Carving — Pictures of, and commentary on, the lapis lazuli carving that inspired the poem.
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The Poet's Life and Work — Read a biography of Yeats at the Poetry Foundation.
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About Callimachus — More on the sculptor via Encyclopedia Britannica.
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Europe in the 1930s — An explainer film on the events that form the background of the poem, including the rise of dictators and the march toward war in 1930s Europe.
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LitCharts on Other Poems by William Butler Yeats
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