The Poem's Inspiration
W. B. Yeats had two major obsessions that deeply influence his creation of this poem. The first was his passionate love for Maud Gonne, fellow Nationalist and his leading lady in the theatre he helped found, who was his muse for decades. Though he asked her to marry him numerous times, she would only consent to what she called a spiritual or mystical marriage. Maud fills his poetry in both explicit and implicit ways, such as his address to her in "When You Are Old" or using numerous symbolic links to his great love, whether the rose, the feminized Ireland, or Greek mythical figures.
The second obsession was his fear of aging and death, which he clearly thought about even as a young man. Yeats seemed haunted by the notion of the aging and dying body, despite believing in reincarnation. Whether in his earlier poems, such as "When You Are Old," or the middle poems, such as "Among School Children," Yeats turned his attention to imagining his beloved ("old and gray") or himself ("old clothes upon old sticks") as elderly, moving toward death. In his biography of Yeats, Terence Brown writes of how "old age and declining masculine prowess are bitterly resented by the poet" (249). So concerned was Yeats with his aging process, especially perhaps after marrying the much younger Georgie Hyde-Lees, that he underwent a surgery in the hope of retaining his vigor. Interestingly, "Under Ben Bulben," which he wrote in his elder years while approaching death, gives some evidence that he had made peace with his eventual demise, noting that others should merely "pass by" his grave without tears.
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