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Questions tagged [t-s-eliot]

Questions about the U.S.-born British poet, literary critic, dramatist and publisher T. S. Eliot (1888 – 1965) and his works. As a poet, Eliot is best known for poems such as "The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock" (1915), "The Wasteland" (1922) and the "Four Quartets" (1943). His plays include "Murder in the Cathedral" (1935) and "The Cocktail Party" (1949). As a critic, he is said to have influenced by New Criticism.

2 votes
1 answer
348 views

Footnotes to T.S. Eliot's The Waste Land

I was surprised to encounter footnotes to the poem in the Project Gutenberg website version, which makes me wonder if these are by the author, included in the original version? How common in general, ...
Buck Thorn's user avatar
2 votes
1 answer
144 views

What does this line from an essay on T. S. Eliot mean?

The following extract is from Charles Altieri's essay "Eliot's Impact on twentieth-century Anglo-American poetry" published in The Cambridge Companion to T. S. Eliot. Here, Altieri is ...
user392289's user avatar
7 votes
1 answer
3k views

“Most of the trouble in the world is caused by people wanting to be important.” Is this a genuine TS Eliot quote?

Most of the trouble in the world is caused by people wanting to be important. This quote has been attributed to TS Eliot, but I can't find any sources for it outside lists of inspirational quotes, ...
Ecstatic blender boogie's user avatar
11 votes
1 answer
2k views

Why did T.S. Eliot compare “waiting for death” with “a feather on the back of the hand"?

A Song for Simeon Lord, the Roman hyacinths are blooming in bowls and The winter sun creeps by the snow hills; The stubborn season has made stand. My life is light, waiting for the death wind, Like a ...
user avatar
21 votes
2 answers
3k views

Did T.S. Eliot really plagiarize in "The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock"?

I've been trying to do research to confirm my English teacher's claim that T. S. Eliot plagiarized works by Jules Laforgue, Henri Bergson, and Andrew Marvell in his poem "The Love Song of J. ...
Beth Hays's user avatar
  • 321
2 votes
0 answers
28 views

How is the poem “Gerontion” affected by being told in the first person?

The poem ‘Gerontion’ by T.S. Eliot is about an old man and his life. The very first lines if the poem are as follows: Here I am, an old man in a dry month, Being read to by a boy, waiting for rain. ...
Knight wants Loong back's user avatar
1 vote
1 answer
405 views

What did Eliot mean when he said “I would suggest that none of the plays of Shakespeare has a meaning”?

I was reading a grammar book in which the discussion was going on about whether to treat “none” as singular or plural, then the book gave this quote by T.S. Eliot: I would suggest that none of the ...
Knight wants Loong back's user avatar
4 votes
1 answer
172 views

Identify the source of this quote by T.S. Eliot

I came across this quote of T.S. Eliot There are a large number of people… who believe that all ills are fundamentally economic. I’m craving to know Eliot’s view on it and for that I need to find ...
Knight wants Loong back's user avatar
3 votes
2 answers
442 views

Can the influence of the 1918 "Spanish flu" pandemic be seen in T.S. Eliot's "The Waste Land"?

A Guardian article from summer 2020, "The Covid novels are arriving. And they'll be a warning to future generations" by Laura Spinney, includes some discussion of the (apparently minimal) ...
Rand al'Thor's user avatar
  • 74.1k
0 votes
1 answer
188 views

Are the names J. Alfred Prufrock and Hugh Selwyn Mauberley completely arbitrary?

T.S. Eliot's first professionally published poem was "The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock", in which Eliot narrates the experience of a character named J. Alfred Prufrock. Similarly, Ezra ...
Knight wants Loong back's user avatar
4 votes
0 answers
103 views

Why does the first chapter of Toni Morrison's "Playing in the Dark" open with this Eliot verse in Black Matters?

As an epigraph a T. S. Eliot verse appears at the beginning of Toni Morrison's Playing in the Dark: Whiteness and the Literary Imagination: I am moved by fancies that are curled Around these images, ...
Eddie Kal's user avatar
  • 1,396
3 votes
2 answers
2k views

Understanding the first dialogue of Archbishop Thomas Becket involving antitheses

In Murder in Cathedral by T.S. Eliot, when Archbishop Thomas Becket returns from France, and sees the second priest scolding the women of Chorus, he says Peace. And let them be, in their exaltation. ...
Knight wants Loong back's user avatar
2 votes
0 answers
95 views

Understanding the meaning of "Eructation of unhealthy souls" in T.S. Eliot's Burnt Norton

In the third section of Burnt Norton we find these lines Eructation of unhealthy souls Into the faded air, the torpid Eructation have two meanings Belching Eruption So, if we take up the second ...
Knight wants Loong back's user avatar
4 votes
1 answer
640 views

Understanding the second section of first part of Burnt Norton by T.S. Eliot

The first section of first part of Burnt Norton seems to be focused on "time", although it is too abstract and as I say "beyond my perceptible sense" but in the least we understand ...
Knight wants Loong back's user avatar
3 votes
1 answer
198 views

Why do all the lines of Burnt Norton seem unconnected?

I'm reading Burnt Norton by T.S. Eliot. I have read its background (that manor house theme) and a few months ago read Murder in the Cathedral (as Wikipedia says says, "He created it while working ...
Knight wants Loong back's user avatar

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