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II
The Bullen papers we have examined obviously served as printer's copy for the Collected Works, and all the changes there made are incorporated into the published text. Comparison of JSD with the Collected Works establishes, however, that a further revision intervened before the 1908 text of John Sherman reached the public. We can only conjecture how and when this took place.
The relationship between Yeats and Bullen during the period when the Collected Works were going through the press was not always a smooth one. Various difficulties presented themselves, exacerbated by Yeats's frequent absences in Ireland and elsewhere, and, it seems, by Bullen's tendency to meddle with the poet's text. Yeats insisted on precise and continuous oversight of his work as it went through the press; Bullen, always in financial straits, had to think in terms of keeping his men employed even if the poet's final word on a particular piece of work had not come through. The tension over this matter reached a high point in the summer of 1907. Writing from Coole Park on July 6 of that year, Yeats says:
The nature of the changes at proof stage can best be shown by citing a few examples, with some brief commentary on each. The list is not complete, even in the matter of substantive changes, and entirely ignores accidentals. A full collation of the Collected Works printing against the English and American editions of JSD will be found in Professor Finneran's work.
- JSD 10, ll. 19-20 the last evening gnats, making circles on the water beneath] CW 187 l. 6 has 'evening flies' in place of 'evening gnats' (F 45, l. 33); Yeats must have felt this change lay in the direction of factual accuracy.
- JSD 15, ll. 4-5 among the provincial youths he felt recherché] CW 190, l. 11 has 'distinguished' for 'recherché' (F 48, l. 1). Yeats probably felt that the French word might well have misleading connotations for his English readers; though it could mean 'refined', the sense of 'far-fetched' or 'odd' was strong in English usage.
- JSD 49, ll. 27-29 she would have been more circumspect about revealing her tastes] CW 211, l.18 has 'cautious' for 'circumspect' (F 62 l. 20). Yeats may have thought the original sentence clumsy and with too many emphatic sibilants.
- JSD [111], ll. 10-11 She scolded him roundly for having answered] CW 247, l. 15 omits 'roundly', Yeats presumably thinking it redundant, and preferring plainness.
- JSD [134], ll. 16-17 "I have been reading that sweet 'Imitation of Christ'] CW 261, l. 23 has 'the' in place of 'that sweet'. The ridiculous phrase must have seemed a crude and cheap way of making a character-point by the time Yeats came to revise the CW proofs.
These changes may be said broadly to continue the process begun in the original preparation of copy for the printer. Yeats maintains his concern with the details of expression, and works further in the direction of simplifying his vocabulary. Yet here, as one might perhaps expect, he turns his attention also towards such matters as characterisation and accuracy of detail. At no point does the revision look like a comprehensive one, yet it might be thought characteristic of Yeats that the first level of reconsideration is mainly verbal in character, and only then does the poet's mind turn to other matters. Yet even this view would have to be modified in the light of the evidence here presented; the distinction is not a clear one.
John Sherman is a minor work, and the revision exemplified by the printer's copy at Stratford is far less extensive and revealing than some of the manuscript and typescript revisions of Yeats material recent scholarship has turned up. Examination of the Stratford papers may, however, be of considerable value in dealing with other bibliographical problems of the Yeats canon that call for a knowledge of Yeats's practice in marking up copy for his printers.
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