This has such an evocative title, I've wanted to read it for decades. I'd expected it to be a lyrical celebration of the folkloric traditions of Ireland, and those parts of it that were that, I found the best. For the rest, it was a collection of brief outlines of fairly typical folkloric tales, interspersed with some slightly longer stories, some of which were interesting. A slightly disappointing read, but still worthwhile. 3.5/5🌟

The Celtic Twilight (1902) is a book of encounters. The encounters Yeats writes of are the meetings between the Irish people and the faeries, but equally interesting are those other encounters: the meetings between the young Protestant poet and the Catholic Irish who tell him their ancient stories so that he can write them down in this book.Although Yeats’ poetry—even the early, overly precious stuff—is always filled with beauties to admire, his prose can sometimes be pedantic and rather dry. I...

William Butler Yeats.When I read this name I think of lyric Irish poetry, a Nobel prize ... and Guinness.Yeats was also a discerning student of Irish fantasy. The emerald isle is, to many, synonymous with legends of faeries and folk tales of the unseen world. In 1893 Yeats published Celtic Twilight, a collection of essays, sketches, and anecdotes all with imagery and language reminiscent of Ireland’s connections to a mystical past. “Folk art is, indeed, the oldest of the aristocracies of thought...

Available to read legally and free on Project Gutenberg: http://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/10459

I'm a sucker for folklore, especially Irish (and Scottish) folklore, because 'tis were my roots lie.I randomly came across this book while scanning through the Kindle classics store on Amazon. Seeing "Celtic" in the title, I immediately downloaded it, not even reading the description. Just the thought of combining classical literature with Celtic...I couldn't help myself.For being a conglomeration of short tales, this little book was a delightfully light read. If you are looking for a palette cl...

As a child I was fascinated by words. The etymology of words. The tones. How some words look similar. How some words sound similar. How words...spell. Faerie and Pharoe. I have also over many years had an interest in different cultures and their similarities. Particularly the Celtic and Egyptian cultures. I have been to Egypt and as a resident of the UK have visited many Celtic sites. Over many years I have wondered about the similarities between these two cultures. Chariots. Pyramids. Mysticism...

I’ve been interested in folklore since I can remember. Irish folklore in particular, while carrying much of the same figures and stories than folklore from adjacent lands, it also quite unique. Yet, as presented here by Yeats, it turns unbelievably magic. Particularly enchanting is to notice how much of Yeats vision of the world seeps into the pages to color every legend and tale. Beautifully written, evocative and interesting. For those who like to read about folklore, the lore of the people, t...

3.5 stars. The first version I bought was awful, a cheap printing and one run-on sentence with poor grammar. The second version I bought is easier to read, but, again with the run-on sentences. While I appreciate the sentimentality of Yeats’ work, the grammar really detracted from the story for me.

This book was interesting and had some fun stories, but I enjoyed the poetry more. Poetry is one thing that I have to be in the right mood for and what was written in this book was just enough to scratch the itch, so to speak. The writing sent me back to a forgotten time, however briefly. It was like listening to stories by a fire.

this is mostly Yeats chatting with the folk from which he would later collect tales; there's some 'once it was hazy and i saw—' but i'd argue this is non-fiction as it primarily details Yeats' travels ---there's definitely a classist overtone; WBY doesn't hide his belief in his cultural/economic superiority---would rec to those interested in collection & preservation of cultures, amateur /professional anthropologists, sociologists, archivists, the generally-inquisitive, et al.

Really don't have many words on it, but it is THE book that I read and instantly fell in love with Ireland. It possesses the power to calm down a palpitating heart. Beautifully written.

In his youth Yeats was a member of the Golden Dawn, an occult society; he wrote this book during that time, and it's widely seen as a manifesto about his belief in faeries and magic and such. And it is that - but it's not what you think. When he says"Let us go forth, the tellers of tales, and seize whatever prey the heart long for, and have no fear. Everything exists, everything is true, and the earth is only a little dust under our feet." (p. 4)he's saying that he believes in magic, yes, but hi...

I feel as if I've been reading and connecting with a lot of Welsh and Irish writing lately. Machen, Graves, (soon to be reading again) Beckett, (also soon to be reading again) Joyce, and now, Yeats. It's probably genetic, to be honest. My dad's biological parents were likely of Irish stock (their last name was Bigley - I got "Aguirre," which is Basque, by the way, not Spanish, at least not in my case - from my adoptive grandparents). My mom was of mixed German (my grandmother was oh-so-German) a...

For those of you who have read Yeats’ ‘Fairy and Folk Tales of the Irish Peasantry’, this book is more of the same. For those of you who haven’t, and those of you with a particularly masochistic bent, here’s the link to my review of said book:Fairy and Folk Tales of the Irish PeasantryThe main difference between this book and that is that Yeats puts more of himself into this one, in a way that’s difficult to define.Stories of particular note were a very early version of ‘Jack and the Beanstalk’

This is Yeats's collection of stories and lore surrounding Celtic fairies, ghosts and spirits. It's available at Librivox.org (audio) and at Sacred Texts.Most of the chapters are pretty short. My favorites are "The Hosting of the Sidhe" (the poem that opens the book), "A Teller of Tales" (Yeats's description of Paddy Flynn, the storyteller who provided him with many of these tales), "The Untiring Ones" (concerning humans who were enchanted by the fairies) "The Man and His Boots" (a funny story a...

A definite must-read for anyone interested in fairy tales, especially the Irish sort, as I've never found anything better. Yeats, of course, should be read for his own sake, anyway, and if you want more Yeats, go for MYTHOLOGIES, the version that includes both the Celtic Twilight and Yeats' own retellings, in prose, of Irish epic stories, as well as his own original tales. There's another Yeats collection of traditional tales--Irish Folk and Fairy Stories--that also includes the Celtic Twilight,...

This was a slow start but this is the faery that I love! Here they are bit good or wholesome, Yeats writes them for the mischievous, ethereal, haunting, fearful, spiteful and vengeful beings that they are!Being the first work of Yeats I've ever read, I was unsure as to what I was getting into but I might just read more of his work. Took a bit for me to wrap my head towards the writing style as I've been reading a lot of modern fiction thus the slow speed but I also think that it had to do with Y...

You can have your cones and interpenetrating gyres; for me, the unguarded, soppy Romanticism of The Celtic Twilight, based on the diaries the young Yeats kept as he tromped through Irish village life, is the best guide to the obsessions and occult yearnings that animate his poetry, early & late. The anecdotes and rambling asides capture the poet in his native habitat, head in the clouds and feet in the bog of an Ireland that never quite was, but that he needed to shake off the bluff rationalism

Yeats believed in faeries. My hero! These are the tricksy meddlesome faeries of Irish myth and legend, and his book chronicles real life documentation of faery happenings and occurences from Irish locals. Yeats was fascinated by the power of myth and how it impacts on everyday life. We have here tales of ghosts, faery pigs in the forest, enchanted glades, changelings, the strange creatures of the hedgerows. What is fascinating is that these are both fabulous tales and a record of popular beliefs...

This is a delightful collection of old Irish folklore, mostly deriving from the area around Ben Bulben and County Sligo. Speaking of the existence of faerie, William Butler Yeats writes:I say to myself, when I am well out of that thicket of argument, that they are surely there, the divine people, for only we who have neither simplicity nor wisdom have denied them, and the simple of all times and the wise men of ancient times have seen them and even spoken to them. They live out their passionate