Uploaded February 2015 | Updated September 2026, 2 weeks ago

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Here's a virtual movie of the great William Butler Yeats reading "Irish Poets Learn Your Trade" from his much longer poem "Under Ben Bulben" which was his final work. Under Ben Bulben is a poem written by celebrated Irish poet W. B. Yeats. It was one of the last poems he wrote, and the last three lines decorate his gravestone in Drumcliffe, County Sligo, Ireland..

The title of Pulitzer Prize-winning author Larry McMurtry's first novel, Horseman, Pass By, is derived from the last three lines of this poem.

Benbulbin,[1][2] sometimes spelled Ben Bulben or Benbulben (from the Irish: Binn Ghulbain), is a large rock formation in County Sligo, Ireland. It is part of the Dartry Mountains, in an area sometimes called "Yeats Country"

Yeats's famous poem, Under Ben Bulben, is basically a description of Yeats Country. It describes the sights that he saw in Yeats Country. The following is an excerpt from Under Ben Bulben:

“ Under bare Ben Bulben's head
In Drumcliff churchyard Yeats is laid.
An ancestor was rector there
Long years ago, a church stands near,
By the road an ancient cross.
No marble, no conventional phrase;
On limestone quarried near the spot
By his command these words are cut:
Cast a cold eye
On life, on death.
Horseman, pass by!

Kind Regards

Jim Clark
All rights are reserved on this video recording copyright Jim Clark 2015