William Butler Yeats (1865-1939) was born in Dublin, Ireland, the eldest of four children born to Susan Pollexfen and John Butler Yeats. While the family lived primarily in Dublin and London, time spent with relatives in County Sligo influenced Yeats' dreams and aspirations. In Sligo he learned the folk lore, myths, and legends which provided the structure and background for so much of his poetry.

An uninspired student, Yeats spent five years at the Godolphin Day School while his father studied painting in London. Upon the family's return to Ireland in 1880 he attended Erasmus High School before being sent to the Metropolitan Art School. His artistic talent proved to be as indifferent as his scholarship, but he came away from the experience with a lifelong friend in his fellow student George William Russell. Russell may have provided impetus to what became Yeats' lifelong interest in mysticism and the occult.

Yeats' first published poems appeared in in 1885. By 1889 Yeats was able to publish an entire volume of poems, When Maud Gonne, an actress and Irish nationalist, sought an introduction to Yeats to praise , Yeats fell immediately in love with her and she became a fixture in his imagination and poetry. She refused his many offers of marriage; however, she encouraged his involvement in the Irish Nationalist movement, thereby adding another dimension to his work.

The 1890s were busy and pivotal for Yeats. His family had returned to London where he co-founded and participated in the Rhymers club with Ernest Rhys, Richard Le Gallienne, Arthur Symons, and Oscar Wilde, among others. He founded the Irish Literary Society in London and in Dublin the National Literary Society, which spread throughout Ireland. During the same period, Yeats began to envision an Irish National Theatre, partly as a vehicle for his first effort at play writing, , but also because he had begun to develop an idea of transforming and uplifting the Irish notion of culture through theatre and literature. In 1896, shortly after returning to live permanently in Ireland, he met Lady Gregory who sought to help the habitually impoverished and frequently ill Yeats. She provided him with summers in the country and it was largely through her efforts that the Irish Literary Theatre, later the Abbey Theater, came into being.

An American lawyer, John Quinn, first met Yeats in 1902 and proposed an American lecture tour. Yeats agreed and in 1903-4 he traveled to America appearing at most of the major American colleges and universities, clubs, and societies. He made an excellent impression and returned for similar tours in 1912 (with the Abbey Theatre troupe), 1914, and 1920.

In 1912, Yeats took up fencing at the suggestion and under the direction of his new secretary, Ezra Pound. Pound also introduced Yeats to Japanese Noh drama, which became a strong influence on his later theatrical works. In 1917, Yeats bought Thoor Ballyle, a stone tower near Coole Park. In the same year, the 52-year-old Yeats married Georgie Hyde-Lee, who was 26. The marriage was a happy one and the couple had two children, Anne Butler (1919) and William Michael (1921).

The year 1922 saw the start of the Irish Civil War, during which Yeats supported the pro-treaty governments, and the death of his father in New York. In 1923 Yeats received the Nobel Prize for Literature. Over the next decade Yeats' health slowly declined; however he continued to write and take an active part in the new politics of Ireland. He worked on a committee to advise the government on a new coinage and in 1928 he served a term in the Irish Senate. By 1936 he was suffering from serious heart problems and nephritis and in January 1939 he died in France. His was originally buried in Roquevurne, France, but in 1948 his remains were reinterred in Drumcliff, County Sligo.