Francesco Floritto VB

The Waste Land

Analysis of The Burial Of The Dead(lines 1-24)

This is an extract of “The Waste Land” by T.S.Eliot; more precisely, it belongs to the first section of the poem named: The Burial of The Dead. Right from the title the reader may wonder the reason why the poet decides to title his poem in this way. From the reading of the poem, the intelligent reader understands that Eliot refers to the modern world. Indeed, he compares it to the burial of a dead.

As concerns, the poem the first word that appears is April. Eliot says that it should be a month of rebirth of blossoms but, if compared with the sterility of the waste land, it is a cruel moment to experience. All this extract is centred on the contrast between fertility and sterility, life and death “summer and rain”, the contrast between a lightning past and a dreadful present. In the 13^th line he says” and when we were children”, and it is a clear example of what I have already said: indeed, he recalls the past, which was a fertile and joyful period. Throughout the whole poem, the focal point is the same: a vivid comparison between a joyful, shining mythical past and the deep spiritual sterility of the present world that has lost every connotation of social and cultural order. Thus, paradoxally the intelligent reader can say that the title is the conclusion of this section and represents its message.

The title is a clever metaphor to represent the damaged condition of the modern man, who lives a life without any sense. Men are alienated and they even seem dead. Moving on with the analysis Eliot makes a detailed description of this waste land: “what branches grow out of this stony rubbish?”, “and the dead tree gives no shelter, the cricket no relief, and the dry stone no sound of water”. The poet tells the reader that the land is dry, sterile, and dead, it allows no regeneration of nature. Once again it is clearly evidenced the dramatic condition in which men live, there is no hope, everything is lost.