Question

sailing to byzantium is a 1928 poem by w.b. yeats, written when the poet was in his sixties and increasingly preoccupied with mortality. in the poem, the speaker describes leaving a country devoted to youth and biological life to journey toward the ancient city of byzantium, which yeats associated with timeless artistic achievement. in the poem, yeats presents the speaker as seeking to transcend the decay of physical existence by being subsumed into an imperishable artistic form that exists outside the cycles of nature. 10 mark for review which quotation from \sailing to byzantium\ most effectively illustrates the claim? a \the young / in one anothers arms, birds in the trees / —those dying generations—at their song, / the salmon-falls, the mackerel-crowded seas, / fish, flesh, or fowl, commend all summer long / whatever is begotten, born, and dies.\ b \once out of nature i shall never take / my bodily form from any natural thing, / but such a form as grecian goldsmiths make / of hammered gold and gold enamelling\ c \an aged man is but a paltry thing, / a tattered coat upon a stick, unless / soul clap its hands and sing, and louder sing / for every tatter in its mortal dress\ d \consume my heart away; sick with desire / and fastened to a dying animal / it knows not what it is; and gather me / into the artifice of eternity.\

Explanation:

The claim is about the speaker seeking to transcend physical decay by being subsumed into an imperishable artistic form outside nature's cycles. Option B says the speaker will leave nature and take a form made by Grecian goldsmiths (artistic, imperishable), matching the claim. Option A describes natural cycles, C focuses on an aged man's need for soul, D is about being gathered into eternity but less directly about the artistic form outside nature.

Answer:

B. "Once out of nature I shall never take / My bodily form from any natural thing, / But such a form as Grecian goldsmiths make / Of hammered gold and gold enamelling"