The Tower, written by W.B. Yeats and published in 1928 marks a thematic departure in Yeats' work, as well as a shift in style; whereas Yeats' earlier work was more concerned with glory and youth, in The Tower, a now middle-aged Yeats realizes that though his creativity is at its peak, his physical abilities will only continue to decline and he has to come to terms with aging, death, destruction and mortality. The stylistic shift is characterized by a more fragmented, modernist approach that often replaces the more flowery and at times almost romantic language of his earlier work. Some of the more imagistic, harsher and "modernist" turns are also a result of Yeats' friendship with Ezra...
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