Yeats's Book of the Nineties is essentially a study of the major works Yeats produced at the height of that literary period known as «the Decadence»: his collection of short fiction, The Secret Rose ; his 1899 volume of poetry, The Wind Among the Reeds; and the essay collection he titled Ideas of Good and Evil . But this is not a «literary» examination, per se ; nor does it accept the traditional portrayal of the young Yeats as consummate aesthete. Instead, it argues for a reading of Yeats's work in the context of his early efforts in journalism and his complex two-fold interest in Irish nationalism and occult spirituality. At this particular site, Myers suggests, matters of aesthetics and politics merge in what Yeats saw as a «new propaganda» for the political and cultural liberation of Ireland. «'Yeats's Book of the Nineties' is a splendid contribution to Yeats scholarship. Until very recently, most of the standard books on Yeats have placed Yeats in the context of British and Irish lyric poetry. Myers done for Yeats what scholars did long ago for Shakespeare, Pope, and Shelley: to place him in the context of the whole gamut of his age's culture, from the lowest to the highest. I believe that no other critic has perceived so acutely the relations between Yeats's poetry and his prose (sometimes hack prose motivated solely by a desire for money) during the crucical decade of the 1890.» (Daniel Albright, University of Rochester) «In the last decade, one major trend in modernist studies has been the rehistoricizing of apparently apolitical literature. Alex Zwerdling's 'Virginia Woolf and the Real World' or Elizabeth Cullingford's 'Yeats, Ireland, and Fascism' come to mind. Myers's Book stands well in this company both as a rereading of Yeat's stylistic development and as a rethinking of aestheticism as it appears generally in modern literature. Even more, the book is lucid and often eloquent - a pleasure to read.» (James Langenbach, University of Rochester) «I was impressed by the breath of Professor Myers's scholarship and his ability to use the primary materials of the time as well as recent scholarship to produce a well-rounded book on Yeats at this critical period in his life. the book is important because Professor Myers correctly sees that the poetry and life cannot be discussed separately - that Yeats's politics and his art wereso intertwined with journalism that only a multi-faceted approach like the one he uses will illuminate Yeats's motivations and even unlock the imagery of the poetry of that period. It is fast-paced and well-written, meticulous in its use of sources and able to integrate its research into a readable, fascinating narrative.» (Elizabeth Fifer, Lehigh University) The Author: Stephen Myers is an assistant professor of English at Allentown College of St. Francis de Sales, Center Valley, Pennsylvania. He received his B.A. degree from Allegheny College and the Ph.D. from the University of Rochester and taught at both places before coming to Allentown. Yeats's Book of the Nineties is his first book.