Notes about some extracts from The Waste Land     vedi Serpi

Unreal City is an extract from "The Waste Land" by T.S.Eliot. It is a part of the first section of the poem, "The Burial of the Dead". This title hints at the antique rites of fertility of the land and  to the Anglican funeral rites.

The description of the City  is vivid and realistic in terms of temporal and local setting. As an example we can find: the City (the financial heart of London), the London Bridge (a bridge across the River Thames leading to the City), King William Street (a street in the City of London), Saint Mary Woolnoth (a 20th century church in the city), ninth hour (the opening time for the offices). Moreover he describes a London which is overcrowded with the commuters going to their offices in the morning.

The description of the City of London is a criticism against his citizens, locked in their routine. First they are compared to the ignavi of Dante's Inferno, because they don't pay attention to other people. After this they are compared to the souls of limb; assuch souls they hope in a better life. but they haven't got any possibility to change their situation.

Intertextuality is frequently used by Eliot. Starting from the first line, the reader immediately notice the use of it. As a matter of fact Unreal City is an allusion to Baudelaire's poem "The Seven Old Men" (Crowded city, city full of dreams / where the ghost in broad daylight stops the passer-by), where London acquires a spectral dimension: it's unreal, full of dreams and inhabited by ghost moving in broad daylight.

In lines 4 e 5 Eliot linked his description of people and life in London to the one of the damned. Line 4 represents the multitude of people that every day work in London and that are compared to the multitude of dead people. Line 5 is an allusion to Inferno Canto IV ("Quivi, secondo che per ascoltare, / non avea pianto mai che di sospiri / che l'aura etterna facevan tremare") and it represents the frantic  life of London where no one has got time. The last quotation is at line 9, where the "final stroke of nine" is an allusion to the Gospel of Luke 23:44 ("and there was a darkness over all the earth until the ninth hour"). Here the context of Christ's death sets the atmosphere of  the context. But nine in 1920 was also the opening time for the offices in the city.

What the Thunder Said  is the title of the fifth of the five sections of the poem. The title draws from an Indian myth in which the Lord of the Creation speaks through thunder. In it the speaker is going through a desolate land.
The first half of the section builds to an apocalyptic climax. The repetitive language, the use of alliteration and harsh imagery suggest that the end is perhaps near, that not only there will be no renewal but not even survival. The language of the extract obsessively resorts to the contrast water-rock in its use of repetition("If there were water/And no rock/If there were rock /And also water...") and it creates an atmosphere of resignation.
In this extract the word "rock" appears 9 times and becomes an allegory for the spirit of the waste land. I think the description of the landscape conveys not only the image of a desolate land but also the sensations to be there.
Moreover the initial imagery associated with the apocalypse is taken from the crucifixion of Christ.
Eliot draws on the traditional interpretation of "what the thunder says" as taken from the Upanishads (Hindu fables). According to such fables, the thunder "gives" and "controls" through its speech.
Finally the speaker, a thirsty man, feels a need for rain.

He hopes the thunder will bring him water but the thunder is dry and sterile and it will not bring him to a better life. The thunder does not satisfy man and it rather increases his desolation.