THE MAKING OF YEATS'S A VISION

Volume I

' Jagram from a George Yeats d" notebook

THE MAKING OF YEATS'S A VISION

A Study of the Automatic Script

Volume 1

George Mills Harper

All those abstractions that you fancied were From the great Treatise of Parmenides; All, all those gyres and cubes and midnight things Are but a new expression of her body Drunk with the bitter sweetness of her youth. And now my utmost mystery is out.

(Yeats, "The Gift of Harun Al-Rashid")

M MACMILLAN

PRESS

© George Mills Harper 1987

Softcover reprint of the hardcover 1st edition 1987

All rights reserved. No reproduction, copy or transmission of this publication may be made without written permission.

No paragraph of this publication may be reproduced, copied or transmitted save with written permission or in accordance with the provisions of the Copyright Act 1956 (as amended).

Any person who does any unauthorised act in relation to this publication may be liable to criminal prosecution and civil claims for damages.

First published 1987

Published by THE MACMILLAN PRESS LTD Houndmills, Basingstoke, Hampshire RG21 2XS and London Companies and representatives throughout the world

British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data Harper, George Mills The making of Yeats's A Vision: a study of the automatic script. 1. Occult sciences I. Title II. Yeats, W. B. Vision 133 BF1411

978-0-333-29474-1

ISBN 978-1-349-05624-8 ISBN 978-1-349-05622-4 (eBook) DOI 10.1007/978-1-349-05622-4ISBN 978-0-333-41409-5 (set)

Contents Frontispiece

List of Illustrations vi

List of Abbreviations and Signs vii

Preface x

Acknowledgements xv

Chronology of Script, 6 November 1917 to 2 Apri/1918 xvi

One 5 November to 12 November 1917 1

Two 20 November to 7 December 1917 38

Three 21 December 1917 to 30 January 1918 74

Four 31 January to 5 March 1918 182

Five 11 March to 2 April 1918 227

Appendix A: Typed Summary of Early Script Filed with the Writing of 8 November 263

Notes 267

Index 293

v

List of Illustrations George Yeats, diagram from a notebook 1 George Yeats, AS, first preserved page 2 Yeats, AS, 21 December 1917 3 Yeats, AS, 21 December 1917 4 George Yeats, AS, 4 March 1918 5 George Yeats, AS, 11 March 1918

vi

frontispiece 9

77 80

215 228

List of Abbreviations and Signs

AS Au CCPl

CF

CVA

E&I

EPS

Ex

L

LWBY

Myth

NCP

NRA NRQ R-A Typescript SPR

Automatic Script Yeats, Autobiographies (London: Macmillan, 1955) A. Norman Jeffares and A. S. Knowland, A Com-

mentary on the Collected Plays of W. B. Yeats (London: Macmillan, 1975)

Card File (Individual cards identified by alpha­numeric references- A1, A2, etc.; the suffix x indicates the back of a card. See Ch. 1, n. 2.)

A Critical Edition of Yeats's 'A Vision' (1925), ed. George Mills Harper and Walter Kelly Hood (London: Macmillan, 1978)

Yeats, Essays and Introductions (London and New York: Macmillan, 1961)

Nandor Fodor, Encyclopaedia of Psychic Science (Secaucus, NJ: Citadel Press, 1974)

Yeats, Explorations, sel. Mrs W. B. Yeats (Lon­don: Macmillan, 1962; New York: Macmillan, 1963)

The Letters of W. B. Yeats, ed. Allan Wade (Lon­don: Rupert Hart-Davis, 1954; New York: Macmillan, 1955)

Letters to W. B. Yeats, ed. Richard J. Finneran, George Mills Harper and William M. Murphy (London: Macmillan; New York: Columbia University Press, 1977)

Yeats, Mythologies (London and New York: Mac­millan, 1959)

A. Norman Jeffares, A New Commentary on the Poems of W. B. Yeats (London: Macmillan, 1984)

No recorded answer No recorded question Robartes-Aherne Typescript The Society for Psychical Research

VII

viii

UPI

UPII

VA VB VBWI

VNB1 VNB2 VP

VPl

YGD

YO

List of Abbreviations and Signs

Uncollected Prose by W. B. Yeats, vol. I, ed. John P. Frayne (London: Macmillan; New York: Columbia University Press, 1970)

Uncollected Prose by W. B. Yeats, vol. II, ed. John P. Frayne and Colton Johnson (London: Mac­millan, 1975; New York: Columbia University Press, 1976)

Yeats, A Vision (London: Werner Laurie, 1925) Yeats, A Vision (London: Macmillan, 1978) Lady Augusta Gregory, Visions and Beliefs in the

West of Ireland (Gerrards Cross, Bucks: Colin Smythe, 1970)

Vision Notebook 1 Vision Notebook 2 The Variorum Edition of the Poems of W. B.

Yeats, ed. Peter Alit and Russell K. Alspach (New York: Macmillan, 1957)

The Variorum Edition of the Plays ofW. B. Yeats, ed. Russell K. Alspach (London and New York: Macmillan, 1966)

George Mills Harper, Yeats's Golden Dawn (Lon­don: Macmillan, 1974)

Yeats and the Occult, ed. George Mills Harper (Toronto: Macmillan of Canada, 1975)

Selected terms abbreviated in the Script

AM Anima Mundi PAM Personal Anima Mundi

Faculties CG Creative Genius (changed to Creative Mind in VA) PF Persona of Fate (changed to Body of Fate in VA)

Moments of Crisis BV Beatific Vision CM Critical Moment IM Initiatory Moment OM [unexplained]

List of Abbreviations and Signs ix

Principles CB Celestial Body PB Passionate Body PB Physical Body (changed to Husk in VA) SB Spirit Body

Signs of the zodiac

y Aries ~ Libra 'd Taurus m Scorpio n Gemini l Sagittarius @ Cancer ;o Capricorn Q Leo

,.,.., Aquarius ,.,..,

TT.P Virgo X Pisces

Astrological planets and their symbols

0 Sun 2j. Jupiter )) Moon h Saturn li Mercury l1f Uranus (Herschel) ~ Venus \,V Neptune d Mars ':j:' Pluto

d Conjunction cP Opposition

Preface The Automatic Script, as George and W. B. Yeats called it, is perhaps the most remarkable body of materials of its kind in the history of psychical research. From its first tentative beginnings, four days after their marriage on 20 October 1917, to the initiation of a new method on 28 March 1920, they recorded and preserved more than 3600 pages in 450 sittings. And a considerable part of their research was lost, misplaced or destroyed, if Yeats's memory is accurate (VB 17-18). During this period they devoted some portion of almost every day, exclusive of time out for travel or illness, to their "incredible" experiments. It is, of course, well known that the Script provided the genesis and basic materials for A Vision. Not so well known is the fact that a high percentage of the Script - perhaps three-quarters or more- was "personal", often intimate, and could not be used in the book. Although after the first few days of fumbling experiments Yeats's questions set the direction and often the subject matter of the research, George and her Controls or Guides were responsible for many of the "factual" details recorded in A Vision. For example, almost all the unidentified quotations in the book as well as many of the lists, including the "Table of the Four Faculties" (CVA 30-3), came from her amazingly fertile mind. For whatever reason, of course, she refused to take credit for her discoveries, maintaining to the end that Thomas of Dorlowicz, Ameritus, or some other of her numerous Communicators was the source of all her information, she being only the Medium or Interpreter.

For the first few days she was clearly experimenting and may have been prompted by an effort to divert an unhappy husband who had been recently rejected by two other women.' But she was soon caught up in her own imaginative scheme and was in fact more readily convinced than Yeats by the revelations of her Communi­cators. Although he often accepted as truth concrete details and psychical concepts which will seem ridiculous to most readers, on numerous occasions, as I will point out, he concluded that he had been deceived, usually by Frustrators, chiefly Leo.2 And he identified these spurious materials by crossing them out and by dating and signing notes registering his doubts. Also he frequently crossed out or rephrased questions, sometimes because of objections by the Corn­municators, clearly suggesting that the Script was not as automatic as he and George insiste<l. In fact, many of the sittings produced organic

X

Preface xi

essays in dialogue reminiscent of the format of essays by Socrates and Oscar Wilde. Years later, in the Introduction to the second version of A Vision, Yeats revealed the method of his inquiry: "Except at the start of a new topic, when they would speak or write a dozen sentences unquestioned, I had always to question, and every question to rise out of a previous answer and to deal with their chosen topic" (VB 10-11). There is, of course, a large body of random Script which was not prompted by recorded questions. Usually these materials, often in the form of warning or advice, appear before or after the numbered questions and answers of the formal Script; and occasion­ally entire evenings were devoted to these unstructured monologues. Often personal, frequently intimate, this tantalizing Script will be exciting to most biographers and some critics, though it had little or no impact on A Vision.

The testimony of a great number of remarks, as well as the tone of hundreds of questions, will convince all but the most sceptical that both George and Yeats accepted as truth the vast body of the Script. When they had exhausted their creative ingenuity in the form of dialogue, they continued the quest by a new method - dreams and Sleeps - recorded in at least four notebooKs, beginning 28 March 1920. Although I have not treated these notebooks in detail, I have quoted frequently, either from the originals or from the unpublished dissertation of Robert A. Martinich. I have quoted far more exten­sively from two other notebooks (one in George's hand, one in Yeats's) and the massive alphabetized Card File (in Yeats's hand), all of which were used to condense and record promising ideas and passages from the Script. With some few exceptions, personal details are not recorded in these repositories, which were, in effect, work­books for A Vision. Since I have transcribed them and hope to publish all three in time, I have referred to the cards by number and the notebooks by page as I found them in the library of Senator Michael B. Yeats. Because no careful study has ever been made of either notebooks or CF, I rather imagine that they remain in the somewhat heterogeneous order carelessly selected by the compilers. The cards, in particular, though usually filed under the letter of headings, are not systematically alphabetized within the letters.

Less useful to me but also significant are other, related materials which I have referred to occasionally: early drafts of A Vision in four manuscripts and one typescript of the Robartes-Aherne Dialogues; a manuscript of "The Twenty-Eight Embodiments" (CVA 38--117); several hundred miscellaneous pages, chiefly typescript, of A Vision.

xii Preface

These records and drafts, all compiled after the completion of the AS, are evidence in themselves of the value Yeats and George placed upon the revelations of the Communicators. Despite occasional facetious remarks and recorded doubts about portions of the Script, they remained believers for the remainder of their lives. More important to Yeats as artist was his conviction that the Communi­cators had come to excite his creative imagination at a time when the well of inspiration was drying up.

One of the tantalizing puzzles is the method George and Yeats devised to conduct their psychical experiments. Since both of them had observed numerous experiments with automatic writing, as I will point out in the text, they approached their great task with some confidence. Also, as an Associate Member of the Society for Psychi­cal Research for at least fifteen years, Yeats had no doubt read its journals; and he had attended hundreds of seances over a period of many years. 3 Perhaps no great literary figure had observed and tested so many different methods of experimentation with extrasensory perception as Yeats had in the period stretching from 1887 (when he joined the Theosophical Society) to 24 October 1917 (when George began to write). Although as a "natural believer" he obviously had faith in many experiments he had studied and observed, he and George discovered a unique method peculiarly suited to their tem­peraments and circumstances. First, and most important, they per­mitted no observers. Although Yeats, as the most excited and confident, several times suggested that outsiders be invited, George and her Controls were adamantly opposed (I will cite instances). They objected also to any discussion of the experiments. Though Yeats lectured to numerous groups about the System they were developing, he did not, I think, talk about their methods, and he was frequently warned not to do so.4

But what actuauy took place at the sittings? Were they patterned on the format of conventional seances? Did George go into the trance of the traditional medium? Did she use any of the usual paraphernalia of the seance room? Did she indeed write automati­cally? If so, was her entire production automatic? And, finally, how automatic, if at all, was Yeats's part in the production? Some answers are clear, others mystifying. As I reconstruct the regular sittings, George and Yeats sat down together at a table. In the beginning (5-20 November 1917) and again at the end (16 June 1919 to 29 March 1920), she recorded both questions and answers, a method that does not suggest full automatism. Nor does the production of the

Preface xiii

long period when Yeats recorded his questions. 5 Since they were alone, George had no need to maintain the appearance of the trance and full automatism, and many scattered casual remarks make clear that she did not do so. Neither the word "trance" nor any near synonym is ever used. There is no suggestion that the lights were blacked out in the daytime or turned out at night, when the great majority of sittings were conducted. If they had worked in a dark­ened room, neither of the Yeatses could have followed the orderly numbered format of the Script. Whether or not they made any effort to pattern their experiments after the traditional seance is not clear, though on one occasion George's Guide referred to "the tap that causes light to come into the glass globe" (13 October 1919)- that is, the crystal ball.

Finally, we need to consider how automatic the writing was -or, at least, how automatic Yeats thought it was. For the first few days (5-12 November 1917) the format is somewhat similar to that of many such experiments. But after the newly-weds returned to Lon­don, where they probably conferred with well-informed friends, the questions, in particular, were more carefully structured and convey little evidence of supernatural origin or automatism. When George resumed the task of recording both questions and answers in June 1919, she gradually changed the appearance of the Script on the page: she wrote in her normal hand, she assumed regular punctuation and capitalization, and - more significantly - she no longer ran the words together from the beginning to the end of the line. Although still implying faith in her Communicators, she abandoned many of the distinctive devices of automatic writing. Frequently fantastic, sometimes absurd to the uninformed reader, George's Script never­theless maintains a kind of strange but severe logic, imposed by Yeats's questions and insisted upon by her Controls.

The Script and the CF are extremely difficult to read. Despite George's early practice of running all the words together, her writing is usually more legible than Yeats's. Having read the Script many times, I am certain of all but a few of the most stubborn problems. To avoid cluttering my transcriptions, I have generally eschewed the use of sic and bibliographical notes, preferring on occasion to enclose a troublesome word in brackets with a question mark. But there are other problems, including inconsistency in punctuation, capitaliza­tion, spelling and grammar. As a rule, I have tried to maintain the text as George and Yeats recorded it, but I have not hesitated to silently correct confusing slips, to change illogical numbering of either

xiv Preface

questions or answers, and to insert numbers- especially at the end of sittings- to clarify the dialogue. And rather frequently, especially in George's early Script, I have used dashes- often justified by breaks or spaces in the text - to assist the reader. I have avoided dashes at the end of George's answers but retained the occasional long lines after questions which were so difficult or embarrassing that she could not or would not respond. In a few instances- usually for clarification -I have used two abbreviations: NRQ for "no recorded question'' and NRA for "no recorded answer".

When the entire corpus of the Script, the CF, the notebooks, the Robartes-Aherne Dialogues, and other Vision papers are published­as they will be in time - other editors and scholars will no doubt disagree with some of my transcriptions and many of my conclusions. Almost certainly they will wish- despite the copious quotations in my text - that I had quoted more extensively or that I had selected other passages to emphasize. I can only plead that nothing but the whole will satisfy the truly involved reader, and I hope that my explication will help to illuminate the most maligned and misunderstood tour de force in the history of modern literature. Although Yeats was aware that some of his readers would "be repelled by what must seem an arbitrary, harsh, difficult symbolism", he was convinced that George's Communicators had "come to give you metaphors for poetry" (VB 23, 8).

Acknowledgements Because this book is based on the great mass of unpublished Vision materials (chiefly the Automatic Script, the Card File, and numerous notebooks), it would have been impossible without the assistance and unfailing generosity of Anne B. Yeats, Senator Michael B. Yeats and his entire family. I am indebted also to Senator Yeats and John Kelly, editor of the forthcoming collection of Yeats's letters by Oxford University Press, for permission to quote brief passages from numerous unpublished letters. I profited greatly from the advice and approval of the late F. S. L. Lyons, who was to have written the official biography; and I appreciate the approval of his successor, Roy Foster. Of the many other people who have assisted me with tran­scriptions, identifications and scholarly advice I can name only a few: David R. Clark, Mary FitzGerald, Warwick Gould, Phillip L. Marcus, William M. Murphy and especially Richard J. Finneran, whose careful reading of the finished typescript enabled me to avoid numerous errors . I have profited also from the experience and advice of numerous graduate students - in particular, Steve L. Adams and Robert A. Martinich, who wrote dissertations on portions of the Vision papers.

Needless to say, I am also indebted to many scholars, without whose research a book such as this would not be possible. Although I have acknowledged all sources of quoted information, I have profited from the work of many others too numerous to mention here.

Finally, I owe a special debt to my wife, who has transcribed hundreds of pages, typed from my difficult manuscript. checked the accuracy of thousands of quotations, and endured my continual impatience and frequent frustrations.

For permission to quote from Yeats's published works acknowledge­ment is gratefully made to Senator Yeats, A. P. Watt Ltd, Macmillan Publishing Co. Inc. (New York), the Macmillan Press Ltd (London) and Macmillan of Canada.

The Florida State University supported my work with funds for travel and research, and the National Humanities Center awarded me a Fellowship at a critical time in the composition of this study.

G.M.H.

XV

Chronology of Script 6 November 1917 to 2 April 1918

Ashdown Forest Hotel Stone Cottage London Stone Cottage London Stone Cottage London Oxford Dublin, Royal Hibernian Hotel Glendalough, Royal Hotel Glenmalure Hotel

6-7 November 1917 8-12 November 13-19 November (no AS) 2(}-29 November, 6-7 December 2-20 December (no AS) 21-29 December 31 December, 1 January 1918 2 January- 5 March 11 March 14-27 March 3(}-31 March, 1-2 April

xvi