Tradition and the Individual Talent (1920) - Notes

In the second part of the extract there is an important statement which expresses T.S.Eliot point of view which seems to anticipate inter-textuality. The statement provides a procedure: the meaning of a poet, T.S.Eliot seems to say, depends largely on his relationship with the "dead" poets. Contrast and comparison are two reference points to evaluate a work of art. This is T.S.Eliot aesthetic principle. In addition he says that this principle is not only an historical principle.

The essay continues with a further statement that allows a better and more precise evaluation of an artist and his/her production. When a new work of art therefore enters the artistic circuit, it allows a new vision of the circuit which includes the new and the old. This happens because T.S.Eliot believed in the concept of simultaneity which included also a simultaneous order.