Thomas Stearns Eliot

He is the most important poet of modernism.

The Waste Land

He wrote The Waste Land, and it is dedicated symbolically to Europe. Eliot used different languages for example Sanskrit, Latin, German and French. Besides he used the dramatic monologue and the reader has the impression to listen the voice of individual monologue because it creates the same effect of drama. The dramatic monologue was introduced in poetry by the Victorian poets Alfred Tennyson and Robert Browning.

The Waste Land is connected to anthropology and in particular to James Fraser who wrote The Golden Bough. He put his attention on mythology, pre-history and ancient symbols. Another was Alfred Tennyson who wrote Idylss of the King in which there are primeval customs, fertility rituals and so on. Besides the text is connected to Jesse Weston’s From Ritual to Romance in which she made a synthesis of the historical and geographical scenery behind medieval Grail legend. In addition Eliot refered to Petronius’ Satyricon because Petronius put his attention on imperial Rome. Besides the text has not a coherent structure because it is fragmentary. And the reader is disappointed because you expect an organized poem for example with feelings and narrative sequences. Therefore Eliot’s method is called composite method and the reader gives meaning to the poem.

Eliot dedicated the Waste Land to Ezra Pound.

Del resto la Sibilla a Cuma l’ho vista anch’io con I miei occhi penzolare dentro un’ampolla e quando i fanciulli le chiedevano: “Sibilla che vuoi?” lei rispondeva “ Voglio morire”.

Sybille were virgin and priestesses of Apollo and they can make responses and predictions.

Reading the title I can say Eliot refers to Europe because it is exit from the World War I and it is destroyed.

April refers to spring in which nature usually sprouts, but in the poem nature is dead. Therefore there is an antithesis between fertility and sterility. Besides lilacs is connected to spring because it is a flower, but it is also connected to dead because it is the colour of priest’s dress of the funeral. The term us means and the its conscience. Besides snow refers to protection of plants and human being. And tubers does not feed because the nature is dead.

In addition Starnbergersee refers to water and in particular to death in water. Eliot underlines the antithesis of death and life because he deals with spring that does not give birth to nature. Then he refers to cosmopolitan characters because they live in place where it is snowing, therefore they go to south. It means that people shelter themselves from winter, but that refers to shortage of energy to face life. In addition roots refers also to protection like colonnade and snow. Therefore the poem refers to land of Europe that was desolated by the war and the loss of values. Nobody can regenerate Europe as spring can not regenerate nature.

In addition red rock is a reference to sterility of earth in opposition to fertility and there is a reference to sloth that means people’s inactivity, because the poet invites people to react. Besides it is a sin and belongs to Christian code. Subsequently a handful of dust refers to funeral, because following Christian tradition a human being is dust and will return dust. Besides there is s reference to a Romantic love by a sailor who has left his woman and to the hyacinth girl. Hyacinths are a symbol of fertility and they are in opposition to sterility of earth and dust. Another symbol of fertility is full which means wealth. While sterility is represented by absence to react for example I could not speak, and my eyes failed, I was neither living nor dead, and I knew nothing, looking into the heart of light, the silence.