BL. W. B. Yeats

71. Peacock, Ronald. ‘Yeats’. In The Poet in the Theatre. London: Routledge, 1946. Reprint, Westport, Conn,: Greenwood, 1986.

Peacock’s adept and influential defence of Yeats as dramatist includes passing but perceptive comment on the relation of his work to the nô: ‘Giving rein to his impulse to keep Shakespeare at the greatest possible distance, Yeats went, finally, to Japan for a model, to the aristocratic “nô” stage. He had written a number of plays before he found this form. . . . But there are many indications that works like The Shadowy Waters (1900, 1911) tend toward this model that sets a seal on his searching. He was to write plays later that in their turn receded from the model, like The Resurrection [28]; but its presence is still felt.’ .