W. B. Yeats’s poem “When You Are Old” (1892) is directly inspired by a sonnet by the 16th-century French poet Pierre de Ronsard, specifically his poem “Quand vous serez bien vieille…” (“When you are very old…”).
1. Direct thematic parallel
Both poems address:
- A woman imagined in her old age
- Reflecting on lost opportunities for love
- With a tone that blends regret, tenderness, and remembrance
- Yeats essentially recreates the premise of Ronsard’s poem but shifts the emotional emphasis from Ronsard’s assertive celebration of poetic immortality to a more wistful, spiritual love.
2. Structural and imagistic resemblance
Ronsard’s poem opens:
Quand vous serez bien vieille, au soir, à la chandelle…
(“When you are very old, in the evening, by candlelight…”)
Yeats’s poem opens:
When you are old and grey and full of sleep…
Both:
- Begin by projecting the beloved into old age
- Depict her sitting by a fire or light source
- Invite her to recall how she was once loved
- The similarity is too strong to be coincidental; it is a recognized intertextual borrowing.
3. Documented literary influence
- Scholars universally note that Yeats’s poem is an adaptation of or homage to Ronsard. Yeats admired Renaissance poetry, and this specific poem of Ronsard’s was widely circulated in English translation during Yeats’s time.
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