A Teacher
Æ (George William Russell)
Irish poet-painter who married mysticism to practical reform.
The transmission
George William Russell, who wrote under the pseudonym Æ, was an Irish poet, painter, editor, and nationalist born in Lurgan, County Armagh. Introduced to Theosophy by W.
B. Yeats, he joined the Theosophical Society in 1890 and lived for years at its Dublin lodge. He became a central figure of the Irish Literary Revival while also organizing agricultural cooperatives.
What they gave
He published poetry beginning with Homeward: Songs by the Way (1894) and the mystical work The Candle of Vision (1918), and edited the Irish Homestead and the Irish Statesman.
The line they stand in
Drawn into the Theosophical Society in 1890 through W. B. Yeats, he became a leading voice in its Dublin circle while shaping the wider Irish literary renaissance.