W.B. Yeats the Choreographer: Composition in the Manuscripts of At the Hawk's Well and The Only Jealousy of Emer

Abstract

This article investigates how William Butler Yeats's interest in, and professional engagement with, modern dance affected the dramaturgical composition of his plays. Instead of focusing on individual dancers' contributions to the dance plays' previous performances, the analysis discusses compositional features that have hitherto gained little critical attention: the plays' use of performance space and stage movement. The main argument of the article is that resulting from his practical experimentation with dance and movement in performance, Yeats's dramaturgical technique changed substantially, and acquired a choreographic quality, which made stage movement and corporeality just as important in his plays' composition as verbal expression. To demonstrate how Yeats's compositional technique evolved between the years of 1916 and 1919, the essay discusses the textual development of two of his early dance plays, At the Hawk's Well and The Only Jealousy of Emer, based on the scrutiny of their extant manuscript materials and performance scripts.