The supernatural and the real world - The innovations of Yeats' poetic drama (Irish folklore)

After the ebb tide of the British drama in the 19th century the imperative innovations towards the end of the century materialised not only in the influential realistic drama of the Ibsen school but in opposition to it in Yeat's innovation of a highly imaginative poetic drama, due to his Irish heritage. Leaving aside Yeat's innovative poetic language and his technique of stage presentation, this study initially is concerned with Yeat's outstanding dramatic imagination or highly imaginative dramatic talent, therefore trying to convey its roots and nourishment, such as (1) Yeat's early environment of Western Ireland, providing him with legends, oral narrative, folktale and myth, - with the Celtic Twilight-mysticism of the Irish and their belief in fairies, ghosts and spirits, and (2) his multifarious interest in the occult, in theosophy and mysticism. Furthermore, this study focuses on Yeat's most Irish and most dramatic motif, his omnipresent consciousness and implication of the supernatural. His presentation of the planes of rational reality and supernaturalness, the intrusion or interference of supernatural powers provoking the central dramatic conflict of the respective plays and determining their plots, will be considered in its various manifestations in his early plays, such as The Land of Heart's Desire, Shadowy Waters, The Hourglass, Cathleen ni Houlihan and others.