Upcoming Programs​​
Taste of the Yeats Summer School
Saturday, 10 a.m. - 4:30 p.m. April 25
We were saddened to hear of the deaths of noted Yeats scholars Warwick Gould and Deirdre Toomey last month. At our “Taste of the Yeats Summer School” program on April 25 at NYU Glucksman Ireland House, Declan Kiely will present a talk written by the University of London Professor Gould, and we will have a short tribute to the couple.
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For more information, visit The Yeats Society​
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2026 Yeats Poetry Prizes
Excerpt from the report of the 2026 judge, Joseph O. Legaspi:
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"What a privilege it was to serve as the judge of the 2026 Yeats Poetry Prizes! Although I must confess, I was initially intimidated by the hundreds of entries I had to sift through alone. But once I settled into a groove during those wintry days, weeks, months, I found myself comforted, uplifted, and charged by the poems. They made good companions, tour guides, and teachers. I was heartened not only by the breadth of subject matters, but the lyrical bravado and well-honed craft of the entries. A truism is that writing is a solitary and oftentimes lonely art, but I felt such a sense of community in my reading."
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Readings marking Poetry Month & presentation of the Yeats Poetry Prizes
Thursday, 6:00 p.m. April 16
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At Barnes & Noble, Union Square, 33 East 17 Street at Park Avenue South. Free​
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Letter from the Executive Board
Dear Yeatsian:
Read the following letter to learn more about our April events.
–The Executive Board
Dr. Alison Armstrong, Andrew McGowan,
Doris Marie Meyer, Luis Torres
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Your Help is Needed, Most Welcome
The Yeats Society is seeking suitable and affordable venues for upcoming programs for our members and friends. We have several programs ready to present: Yeats and the Indian poet Tagore; Two Noble New Yorkers, John Butler Yeats and John Quinn; and the Yeats-Lady Gregory short play, The Pot of Broth, coupled with a short comic piece imagining a dialogue, in their own words, between Yeats and Jonathan Swift. Email recommendations to AndrewJJMcGowan@Gmail.com.
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More programs to be announced later. See PAST EVENTS for list of our programs in 2024/2025.
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Yeats-Related News
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When we can, we mention news of interest to Yeats Society members and Yeats fans.
​If you have something specific that relates to him or his family, we'll try to mention it. Send it via email from our Contact Page form. We do not publish ads or other promotional information about Yeats, Sligo, or Irish products, services, tours, and other commercial offerings. If we did, we'd be overwhelmed. We also don't take advertising.
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2025 Yeats Poetry Prizes Announced:
Winners from UK, NH, TN, IL, NY
The WB Yeats Society of NY has announced six recipients of its 2025 Yeats Poetry Prize, the 28th year of the international competition, open to poets of all ages from anywhere in the world. Founded in 1990, the society is dedicated to the legacy of the world-famous Irish poet and Nobel Laureate.
First Prize:
"Looming Light" by Elly Katz, New York City
Second Prize:
"The Elephants" by Leonardo Chung, Ottawa, IL.
Honorable Mentions:
"Persephone at Nine Weeks" by Chelsea Woodard, Exeter, NH.
"Song for a Spotted Flycatcher" by Harry Man, Durham, United Kingdom.
"Madame President” by William O'Neal II, Brooklyn, NY.
"Song for Bloody Memory" by Elana Churchill, Murfreesboro, TN.
Poet and professor January O’Neil, 2025 judge, praised the quality of the winning poems from among the hundreds submitted. “Once again,” she said, “we see the enduring power of poetry. Poems reveal the heart’s core. They are a healing force.”
First prize was $1,000, second prize $500. The winning poems are published in the Judge’s Report, which will appear on the society’s website later this spring. Each recipient also receives a plaque, a two-year society membership, and is invited to a free-admission public awards ceremony and reading of their poems in New York City, Thursday, April 24, 6:30-7:30 p.m. at the Barnes & Noble flagship Union Square, 33 East 17 Street, NYC. The poets will also be honored at a private dinner at the National Arts Club.
Previous judges of the Yeats Poetry Prize include poets L.S. Asekoff, Billy Collins, Alfred Corn, Alan Feldman, Jessica Greenbaum, Eamon Grennan, Ann Kjellberg, Campbell McGrath, Leslie McGrath, Samuel Menashe, Paul Muldoon, Marie Ponsot, Alice Quinn, Spencer Reese, Grace Schulman, Harvey Shapiro, and Bill Zavatsky.
For more information on the prize and the WB Yeats Society of NY, visit www.yeatssociety.nyc. The 2026 competition will accept poems from September 1, 2025, to February 1, 2026.
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​Canadian folksinger-songwriter Loreena McKennitt (right) visited the National Arts Club in late 2024 to hear about Yeats connections (she's a fan) to NAC and NYC from Yeats Society president Andrew McGowan (left). Here they stand with a sculpture by NAC member Paul Manship, who was one of the artists who submitted designs for the new Irish Republic's coinage, to be judged by a committee headed by Senator Yeats. That night at her concert at Town Hall, she mentioned the visit, as an introduction to her version of Yeats's "The Stolen Child."
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Yeats Poem Plaque in New York City on Library Way
In the late ’90s, the Grand Central Partnership transformed East 41st Street between Fifth Avenue and Park Avenue into a dramatic promenade to the New York Public Library’s majestic Stephen A. Schwarzman Building, the length of which is regularly studded with bronze sidewalk plaques featuring quotes from literature and poetry and the whole of which is now known as “Library Way.” ​
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