“The drunkenness of things being various”: symbols in Louis Macneice’s poetry of the 1930s
“The drunkenness of things being various”: symbols in Louis Macneice’s poetry of the 1930s

Summary/Abstract: This article intends to examine the symbolic significance of the imagery and the form of the Anglo-Irish poet Louis MacNeice’s poetry of the 1930s in terms of certain characteristic aspects of his representation of his sense of personal and social crisis within the context of a turbulent historical period that covers the years leading up to the Second World War. The article argues that the terms of this representation are inseparable from Louis MacNeice’s concern with, and conception of, the nature of the art of poetry and his role as a poet. Hence, this study will investigate selected poems from the poet’s work during the 1930s in the light of his critical essays that explore and comment on his own as well as others’ work, at a time when the function of poetry in relation to historical and social dilemmas had become an issue of debate in literary circles.

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