NCERT Class 9 The Lake Isle of Innisfree PDF Notes: Summary, Word Meanings & Q&A | Nextoper

Class 9 English Chapter The Lake Isle of Innisfree notes on this page cover everything you need for revision: the poem, a stanza-wise summary, word meanings, themes, and answers to the NCERT questions. William Butler Yeats wrote this short lyric about longing for a peaceful island he knew as a boy, and it comes up often in class tests because every line carries an exam-worthy idea.

Whether you have ten minutes before a test or an hour to actually understand the poem, this page is built to work both ways. Use the contents below to jump straight to what you need.

On this page:

• The Poem
• Chapter Overview
• Stanza-Wise Summary
• Word Meanings (Glossary)
• Themes
• NCERT Question Answers
• Quick Revision Notes
• Important/Previous Year Questions
• MCQs
• FAQs

The Poem

I will arise and go now, and go to Innisfree, And a small cabin build there, of clay and wattles made: Nine bean-rows will I have there, a hive for the honeybee, And live alone in the bee-loud glade.

And I shall have some peace there, for peace comes dropping slow Dropping from the veils of the morning to where the cricket sings; There midnight’s all a glimmer, and noon a purple glow, And evenings full of the linnet’s wings.

I will arise and go now, for always night and day I hear the lake water lapping with low sounds by the shore; While I stand on the roadway, or on the pavements grey, I hear it in the deep heart’s core.

— William Butler Yeats

Chapter Overview

Get free Class 9 English Chapter 4 The Lake Isle of Innisfree PDF notes 

Innisfree is not a made-up dreamland. It is a small, uninhabited island in Lough Gill, in County Sligo, on the west coast of Ireland. Yeats spent boyhood summers near the lake with his mother’s family, and he later said the poem came to him on a London street, when the sound of water trickling from a shop-window fountain suddenly made him homesick for that lake. He wrote it in 1888 and published it two years later. He never actually built the cabin, grew the beans, or kept the bees described in the poem — the whole first stanza is a plan he only ever carried out in imagination.

That gap between the real island and the imagined life on it is worth remembering. It explains why the poem works: Yeats isn’t reporting a memory, he’s using a real place as a container for a longing that has very little to do with the island itself.

Stanza-Wise Summary

Stanza 1 — the plan. The poet decides, right now, to go to Innisfree. He pictures a small cabin made of clay and wattles (twisted sticks used for walls and fences), nine rows of beans to grow food, and a beehive for honey. He wants to live there completely alone, in a glade (a clearing) loud with the hum of bees.

Stanza 2 — the peace. He imagines the peace of the island arriving slowly, like dew falling from the misty veils of early morning, right up to where a cricket is singing. At midnight the island glimmers faintly; at noon the light turns a soft purple; in the evening the air is full of a linnet (a small brown-and-grey songbird) flying about. Each time of day offers its own quiet beauty.

Stanza 3 — the longing. The poet repeats his opening line — “I will arise and go now” — because the sound of Innisfree’s lake water lapping the shore never leaves him. Even standing on a city roadway or grey pavement, far from Ireland’s countryside, he can still hear that sound “in the deep heart’s core” — meaning it lives in the most private part of him, whether or not he is physically there.

Word Meanings (Glossary)

Themes

Nature versus the city. The poem sets the calm, self-sufficient life on Innisfree against the “roadway” and “pavements grey” of the city, where the poet actually stands. Grey is not a neutral colour choice here — it signals dullness and lifelessness against the island’s colour and sound.

Peace as something internal. By the last stanza, it’s clear the poet doesn’t need to physically reach Innisfree to feel its pull. The lake water “in the deep heart’s core” shows that the island has become a state of mind as much as a destination — memory alone can supply a kind of peace.

Nostalgia for boyhood. The poem is rooted in a real memory of childhood summers, and that personal history gives the longing its weight; this isn’t abstract nature-worship, it’s homesickness for a specific place and time.

A common mistake to avoid: many students write exam answers as if Innisfree is purely symbolic or imaginary. It’s better to say it’s a real place the poet is using as a symbol — that distinction earns more marks in “theme” and “title justification” answers.

NCERT Question Answers

Q1. What kind of place is Innisfree? Innisfree is a peaceful, natural island. In stanza 1 the poet wants to build a small clay-and-wattle cabin, grow nine rows of beans, and keep bees. In stanza 2 he describes what he would see and hear there — misty mornings, a singing cricket, a glimmering midnight, a purple noon, and evenings full of a linnet’s wings — all of which bring him calm. In stanza 3, even far from the island, he still hears the lake water lapping the shore in his heart.

Q2. How does the poet contrast Innisfree with where he now stands? He is standing on a city roadway or grey pavement — a picture of noise, hardness, and dullness — completely unlike the natural colour and quiet of Innisfree. The contrast makes his longing to leave feel more urgent.

Q3. Is Innisfree only a place, or a state of mind? It is both. It began as a real island Yeats knew as a boy, but by the poem’s end it has become an inner refuge he can reach through memory and imagination alone, without ever leaving the city.

Q4. What pictures do “bee-loud glade,” “evenings full of the linnet’s wings,” and “lake water lapping with low sounds” create? Together these phrases build a scene alive with gentle sound and movement: bees humming through a clearing, a small bird fluttering in the evening light, and water rhythmically touching the shore — a place that feels calm precisely because it is quietly busy with small natural sounds.

Q5. What does “peace comes dropping slow…from the veils of the morning” mean, and what does “to where the cricket sings” mean? Yeats compares peace to dew, something that gathers gradually rather than arriving all at once, falling from the thin morning mist. “To where the cricket sings” places that peace geographically and sensually — it settles right at the spot where the cricket’s song can be heard, tying the feeling of calm to a specific, audible point in the landscape.

Quick Revision Notes

• Poet: William Butler Yeats, Irish poet, awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1923
• Form: Lyric poem, 3 stanzas, abab rhyme scheme
• Setting: Innisfree — a real, uninhabited island in Lough Gill, County Sligo, Ireland
• Central idea: Longing to trade city life for the peace of nature; that peace turns out to live in memory as much as in the place itself
• Key devices: repetition (“I will arise and go now”), alliteration (“lake water lapping with low sounds”), metaphor (peace as dew), personification (morning wearing “veils”)
• Memory trick — 3 stanzas, 3 senses: Stanza 1 = touch/sight (building the cabin), Stanza 2 = sound + sight (cricket, changing light), Stanza 3 = sound (the lake, heard even in the city)

Important / Previous Year Questions

• Extract-based questions on the “peace comes dropping slow” lines have appeared repeatedly in past board terms — know this stanza’s word meanings and metaphor cold.
• “Name the literary device” questions frequently target the same three lines: the dew metaphor, the personified “veils of the morning,” and the alliteration in stanza 3.
• Short-answer questions often ask directly why the poet wants to go to Innisfree, and what the grey pavements symbolise — both are answered above.
• Long-answer questions tend to ask whether the poem is about escapism; a strong answer should mention that the escape is imaginative rather than literal, since the poet never actually leaves.

MCQs

1. Innisfree is located in: a) Scotland b) County Sligo, Ireland c) Wales d) London
2. The rhyme scheme of the poem is: a) abcb b) abab c) aabb d) abba
3. “Wattles” means: a) Small boats b) Twisted sticks for building fences/walls c) Types of beans d) Birds
4. The poet compares peace to: a) Rain b) Morning dew c) Wind d) Sunlight
5. Where does the poet stand while remembering Innisfree? a) In a forest b) On a boat c) On a city roadway/pavement d) On the island itself

(Answers: 1-b, 2-b, 3-b, 4-b, 5-c)

FAQs

What is the summary of The Lake Isle of Innisfree? The poet longs to leave city life and return to Innisfree, a peaceful island where he will build a small cabin, grow beans, and live surrounded by the sounds of bees, crickets, and lapping lake water. Even while standing on grey city pavements, he hears that lake water in his heart.

What does “peace comes dropping slow” mean? Yeats compares peace to morning dew falling gently and gradually. It suggests calm does not arrive suddenly at Innisfree; it settles in slowly, the way mist or dew descends over a quiet morning landscape.

Is Innisfree a real place? Yes. Innisfree is a small, uninhabited island in Lough Gill, County Sligo, Ireland, where Yeats spent boyhood summers. He never actually built a cabin there; the poem imagines a life he never lived.

What is the theme of The Lake Isle of Innisfree? The poem’s central theme is the contrast between the peace of nature and the noise of city life, along with the idea that memory and imagination can carry inner peace with a person wherever they stand.

What is the rhyme scheme of the poem? Each of the three stanzas follows an abab rhyme scheme, giving the poem a steady, musical rhythm that suits its calm, lyrical mood.

To sum up, this poem rewards close reading of just twelve lines — know the glossary, the “dew” metaphor, and the real-place fact above, and you can handle almost any question CBSE sets on it.

More Notes:

• Class 9 English Chapter 1 The Road Not Taken PDF Notes
• Class 9 English Chapter 2 Wind PDF Notes
• Class 9 English Chapter 3 Rain on the Roof PDF Notes
• Class 9 English Beehive Full Chapter Index

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Author: Nextoper Editorial Team. This page follows the NCERT Beehive textbook (Class 9, CBSE 2025-26 session).