T.S.Eliot
Thomas Stearns Eliot was born in St. Louis, Missouri, U.S.A. He graduated from Harvard University in 1909. He went to London in 1914. He remained there and worked in different professions. He became a British subject in 1927. He served English literature, until his death, he died in London itself. However, he visited America as lecturer and teacher but he was no more an American.
Eliot’s poetry is poetry of social change. He was dejected and frustrated with society’s behaviour. He discarded many established norms and straightforwardly attacked on the ideological chaos of present society. Look at these lines-
We are the hollow men
We are the stuffed men
Leaning together
Headpiece filled with straw. Alas!
The above stanza is taken from Eliot’s one of the finest creation, ‘The Hollow Men’ (1925). The poem is not only a powerful strike on people’s ordinary behaviour towards beauties occur in life and after life but it is also shown as breaking the rule of orthodox poetry. The lines are long and short and they are not following the rhyming scheme. The poetic devices are often ignored in Eliot’s poetry. ‘The Hollow Men’ had made mark in literary arena. It showed that Eliot possessed a distinct art of writing poetry that did not look like orthodox art of writing poetry, especially in physical manner.
Eliot’s revolutionary methodology not only influenced English poets and writers but also writers from other parts of the world. I remember, noted Hindi writer Agey (1911-1987) who was torchbearer of progressive poetry movement in Hindi poetry writes on several occasions that Eliot has heavily influenced him. Eliot’s imageries were fresh and new, they broke the old, heavy and dull stone of metaphors. The age of lyrical ballad and melancholy elegy has transformed into the age of broken verses where the poet is not bound to poetic devices. This happened in England only due to Eliot’s mastery. The similar thing happened in India in 1940s, when Agey edited ‘Taar Saptak’ (It was an anthology of poems of seven poets, edited by Agey )
This book had all new kind of poetry having new imageries, new metaphors and new similes. They were too simple to be called lyrical. This was called – Nayee Kavita (new poetry) by Agey.
Eliot was, as said earlier disappointed with the moral decaying of society. He makes mockery of the achievements of society of his time. In a poem he creates, an imaginary character called Macavity, which is troublesome for everybody in the society-
Macavity is a cat; he’s called the Hidden Paw-
For he’s the master criminal who can defy the Law.
He is the bafflement of Scotland Yard, the flying squad’s despair
For when they reach the scene of crime - Macavity is not there!
Macavity, Macaviy, there is no one like Macavity;
He’s broken every human law; he breaks the law of gravity
His powers of levitation would make a fakir stare;
And when you reach the scene of crime – Macavity’s not there
His most famous work is probably ‘The waste land’ published 1992. His friend and critic Ezra Pound (1885-1972) edited this book. He himself was a great poet. He promoted a number of poets and was harbinger of modern movement in English and American literature. Eliot was also one of them who got promotion and acclaim with the buck up of Pound. Initially ‘The waste land’ had 800 lines but on the suggestion of Ezra Pound Eliot cut it down to 433 lines. The wasteland brought him an international reputation. The wasteland was an example of disillusionment with world. This disillusionment and dejection was created by World war one.
When he left America, he spent one or two years in France and attended Bergson’s philosophical lectures, which influenced him too much. There he read heavily about mystical poets. John Donne, Webster, influenced him. He came back to America in 1911 to study Indian philosophy at Harvard. He even learnt Sanskrit but he again went to Europe and never could reside in America again.
This was the time he had started writing poetry. His poetry during undergraduate study was conventional and simple. Later he developed his own style. His first important publication, which was going to set a mark of modernism in English, was ‘The love song of J. Alfred Prufrock. Eliot showed with this, that he’s not only master of letter but also he has brought something new in English. This new was not only Eliot’s personal ambition but it was the need of time. Eliot was trying to create new verse rhythms based on rhythms of contemporary speech. He sought a poetic diction that might be spoken by an educated person being “neither pedantic nor vulgar” (Eliot’s own words)
Thomas Stearns Eliot was born in St. Louis, Missouri, U.S.A. He graduated from Harvard University in 1909. He went to London in 1914. He remained there and worked in different professions. He became a British subject in 1927. He served English literature, until his death, he died in London itself. However, he visited America as lecturer and teacher but he was no more an American.
Eliot’s poetry is poetry of social change. He was dejected and frustrated with society’s behaviour. He discarded many established norms and straightforwardly attacked on the ideological chaos of present society. Look at these lines-
We are the hollow men
We are the stuffed men
Leaning together
Headpiece filled with straw. Alas!
The above stanza is taken from Eliot’s one of the finest creation, ‘The Hollow Men’ (1925). The poem is not only a powerful strike on people’s ordinary behaviour towards beauties occur in life and after life but it is also shown as breaking the rule of orthodox poetry. The lines are long and short and they are not following the rhyming scheme. The poetic devices are often ignored in Eliot’s poetry. ‘The Hollow Men’ had made mark in literary arena. It showed that Eliot possessed a distinct art of writing poetry that did not look like orthodox art of writing poetry, especially in physical manner.
Eliot’s revolutionary methodology not only influenced English poets and writers but also writers from other parts of the world. I remember, noted Hindi writer Agey (1911-1987) who was torchbearer of progressive poetry movement in Hindi poetry writes on several occasions that Eliot has heavily influenced him. Eliot’s imageries were fresh and new, they broke the old, heavy and dull stone of metaphors. The age of lyrical ballad and melancholy elegy has transformed into the age of broken verses where the poet is not bound to poetic devices. This happened in England only due to Eliot’s mastery. The similar thing happened in India in 1940s, when Agey edited ‘Taar Saptak’ (It was an anthology of poems of seven poets, edited by Agey )
This book had all new kind of poetry having new imageries, new metaphors and new similes. They were too simple to be called lyrical. This was called – Nayee Kavita (new poetry) by Agey.
Eliot was, as said earlier disappointed with the moral decaying of society. He makes mockery of the achievements of society of his time. In a poem he creates, an imaginary character called Macavity, which is troublesome for everybody in the society-
Macavity is a cat; he’s called the Hidden Paw-
For he’s the master criminal who can defy the Law.
He is the bafflement of Scotland Yard, the flying squad’s despair
For when they reach the scene of crime - Macavity is not there!
Macavity, Macaviy, there is no one like Macavity;
He’s broken every human law; he breaks the law of gravity
His powers of levitation would make a fakir stare;
And when you reach the scene of crime – Macavity’s not there
His most famous work is probably ‘The waste land’ published 1992. His friend and critic Ezra Pound (1885-1972) edited this book. He himself was a great poet. He promoted a number of poets and was harbinger of modern movement in English and American literature. Eliot was also one of them who got promotion and acclaim with the buck up of Pound. Initially ‘The waste land’ had 800 lines but on the suggestion of Ezra Pound Eliot cut it down to 433 lines. The wasteland brought him an international reputation. The wasteland was an example of disillusionment with world. This disillusionment and dejection was created by World war one.
When he left America, he spent one or two years in France and attended Bergson’s philosophical lectures, which influenced him too much. There he read heavily about mystical poets. John Donne, Webster, influenced him. He came back to America in 1911 to study Indian philosophy at Harvard. He even learnt Sanskrit but he again went to Europe and never could reside in America again.
This was the time he had started writing poetry. His poetry during undergraduate study was conventional and simple. Later he developed his own style. His first important publication, which was going to set a mark of modernism in English, was ‘The love song of J. Alfred Prufrock. Eliot showed with this, that he’s not only master of letter but also he has brought something new in English. This new was not only Eliot’s personal ambition but it was the need of time. Eliot was trying to create new verse rhythms based on rhythms of contemporary speech. He sought a poetic diction that might be spoken by an educated person being “neither pedantic nor vulgar” (Eliot’s own words)
In 1919, he published poems, which contained the celebrated poem ‘Gerontion (meaning old age; here in the poem an old man is depicted). This poem is interior monologue. Some lines from this poem are given below-
Here I am, an old man in a dry month,
Being read to by a boy, waiting for rain
I was neither at the hot gates
Nor knee deep in the salt marsh heaving a cutlass
Bitter by flies fought
Interior monologue means a literary piece in which the narrator talks about himself he gives his own description. This had not ever happened in English.
Eliot’s poetry was developing along with his works on criticism. He wrote many masterly woven essays on poetry and philosophy. The first book in this series was the ‘Sacred wood’ (1920). He himself said that a poet must write “programmatic criticism” that expresses the poet’s own interest as a poet. This book helped in understanding Eliot’s unorthodox poetry. Other important books of criticism, were ‘The use of poetry and the use of criticism’(1993), ‘Thoughts after Lambeth’(1931), ‘The Idea of Christian Society’ and ‘Notes Towards the Definition of Culture’(1948). These essays were broadening the space of criticism into the space of the sociology and philosophy.
The criticism by Eliot was actually trying to grasp the essence of theology and philosophy also and same ploy he was using in his poetry and it was at its best when he was converted to subject of Church of England. That is why his critics say that his poetry and criticism were interwoven.
The masterpiece created by Eliot is ‘The four quartets’. This book has four parts; the first quartet ‘Burnt Norton’ was written in 1936, three other quartets are ‘East Coker’ (1940), ‘The Dry salvages’ (1941) and ‘Little Gidding’(1942). These four quartets were published as a single book in 1943. This book led Eliot to the award of Nobel Prize in 1948 for Literature.
Eliot had written many plays, which were performed in London, but they were not claimed as artistic as his poetry is. He started writing plays in 1920s but abandoned in 1930s. After World war-two, he resumed writing plays. Prominent among them are ‘The cocktail Party’ (1949), ‘The confidential clerk’ (1953), ‘The Elder Statesman’ (1958). These plays could not get such popularity as his poetry had.
Eliot died on 4th January 1965 in London England.
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