For centuries, many men have attributed partaking in war as partaking in glory.
Even a century after T.S. Eliot published “The Wasteland” (1922), it remains a common sentiment. War is even romanticised in the West, as many of us are now removed from first hand accounts of its devastation.
Indeed, it is even a business model for some.
At time of writing, it was a period of great reckoning for the world. “The Wasteland” is a monumental feat. When I picked it up on Sunday afternoon, eager to finally read it in its entirety, I had no intention of how grand, difficult, and awe-inspiring it would be.
A unified voice
It is a poem in five parts, comprised of fragments and of many voices. It contains lines in six different languages, and 60 allusions from over 40 different writers. The most important thing to know about this piece of literature however, is best stated in a lecture by Nick Mount, professfor of English at the University of Toronto:
It is bits of culture, broken up by war and re-assembled into a new frame.
Eliot is trying to compose a unified voice of humanity in post-war Europe.
Morale was flattened and many cities on the continent appeared as literal wastelands by the time the armistice was signed on 11 November 1918. People were searching for ways to avoid such future destruction and to find new footing not just politically, but socially and spiritually as well. The war saw the collapse of the German, Austro-Hungarian, Russian and Ottoman Empires and H.G. Wells even referred to it as “The war to end war”, due to the sheer amount of death and destruction it wraught…we know now, his prediction would not come to pass.
Shifting culture
“The Wasteland” marks the beginning of a new era: along with it, in 1922 we also saw the publication of Joyce’s “Ulysses”, perhaps the finest work of literature in the 20th century, the re-emergence of cubism, the founding of the Irish Free State, and the move to carve up the Levant via the League of Nation’s Mandate for Palestine and Transjordan. The world was changing rapidly, in ways never before envisioned: art was reflecting that change and asking meaningful questions.
Thus, Eliot creates a picture composed of fragments and different perspectives of this time. I seek to highlight now what stands out as most poignant to me; that which seem to be lessons we should have learned a long time ago.
I. The Burial of the Dead
The first part, “The Burial of the Dead” begins:
April is the cruellest month, breeding
Lilacs out of the dead land, mixing
Memory and desire, stirring
Dull roots with spring rain.
Winter kept us warm, covering
Earth in forgetful snow, feeding
A little life with dried tubers.
Who could see cruelty in the emergence of spring, new life, and a renewed landscape other than someone tormented by the atrocities of war? Another voice then enters the scene, speaking in a different tone:
Summer surprised us, coming over the Starnbergersee
With a shower of rain; we stopped in the colonnade,
And went on in sunlight, into the Hofgarten,
And drank coffee, and talked for an hour.
It is the voice of someone removed from the horror; someone attempting to carry on as if none of it were real. It reminds me of some of us a century later who bury our heads in the sand by avoiding overconsumption of news media…by logging off and turning inward: we seek simple solace in a cup of coffee, a stroll in a garden, conversation with a friend: anything to not lament or cause worry about the concerning things occurring in our world.
Is that right though? Are we in a way also complicit in atrocities by tuning out and not doing our part, however small? Because the painful truth is, whether we pay attention or not, they continue…this is something I ask of myself this morning.
Unreal City,
Under the brown fog of a winter dawn,
A crowd flowed over London Bridge, so many,
I had not thought death had undone so many.
Sighs, short and infrequent, were exhaled,
And each man fixed his eyes before his feet.
Here, Eliot evokes Dante: “I had not thought death had undone so many”. This line comes from the Third Canto of “Inferno”, where he witnesses thousands suffering on the edge of hell: a place reserved for souls who while on earth simply blew about with the wind, with no great intention of doing good or evil.
Eliot paints a bleak image: the winter dawn is not bright, but depressed by a brown fog. The morning commuters are likened to those in Dante’s description; however alive in the moment, they are in a way already dead. Empty, half-asleep, monotonously drifting about their day without attention to their surroundings. The post-war world, the wasteland, is populated by drones.
I was consistently struck with how so much of this poem is applicable to how many of us see the present day, 102 years later. Not much has changed. It seems, humanity has learned little when it comes to living a full and self-aware life.
II. A Game of Chess
Now Albert’s coming back, make yourself a bit smart.
He’ll want to know what you done with that money he gave you
To get yourself some teeth. He did, I was there.
You have them all out, Lil, and get a nice set,
He said, I swear, I can’t bear to look at you.
And no more can’t I, I said, and think of poor Albert,
He’s been in the army four years, he wants a good time,
And if you don’t give it him, there’s others will, I said.
Oh is there, she said. Something o’ that, I said.
Then I’ll know who to thank, she said, and give me a straight look……You ought to be ashamed, I said, to look so antique.
(And her only thirty-one.)
I can’t help it, she said, pulling a long face,
It’s them pills I took, to bring if off, she said.The chemist said it would be all right, but I’ve never been the same.
Part II finds us overhearing gossip in a pub. We eavesdrop upon a woman telling another (who’s husband is returning from war) to get herself together and give him “a good time”, because if she doesn’t, “there’s others will”. Her husband had even gone so far to say, “I can’t bear to look at you” at one point, yet the other woman insists she makes herself appealing for him.
With the dialogue here so full of interruption, it can be difficult to make sense, but surely Eliot is speaking to a harshness of the day and age: even in marriage, an institution which is supposed to exude gentleness and respect between two individuals, this man had every right to seek pleasure elsewhere if his wife would not clean up and provide it as he saw fit. The next lines also reveal she has had five children already, nearly dying giving birth to one, and the “pills” she references are surely to initiate an abortion…which is where the money went.
She trusted the chemist. She trusted it would fix her marriage, but instead it has altered her permanently for the worse and still in her suffering, she is expected to do as her husband sees fit. How incredibly tragic. Today, many continue to buy into the lie that drugs and medicating can fix us, that it is necessary to be slimmer, more attractive, or more productive if we are to have value in society…that we need to make others happy above our own needs. The discontent and sadness persists.
III. The Fire Sermon
He, the young man carbuncular, arrives,
A small house agent’s clerk, with one bold stare,
One of the low on whom assurance sits
As a silk hat on a Bradford millionaire.
The time is now propitious, as he guesses,
The meal is ended, she is bored and tired,
Endeavours to engage her in caresses
Which still are unreproved, if undesired.
Flushed and decided, he assaults at once;
Exploring hands encounter no defence;
His vanity requires no response,
And makes a welcome of indifference.
(And I Tiresias have foresuffered all
Enacted on this same divan or bed;
I who have sat by Thebes below the wall
And walked among the lowest of the dead.)
Bestows one final patronising kiss,
And gropes his way, finding the stairs unlit…
Tiresias (the blind prophet of Apollo, cursed to experience both male and female identities; thus he could understand both perspectives) narrates as he attempts to see beyond the physical wasteland. In this passage, a sailer arrives home for what ought to be a loving, wholesome reunification with his wife, but which turns into a corrupted sexual experience. The typist (the woman here), sets a place for her lover and prepares the home with care - regardless, she is treated violently and without care.
It is crushing to read: “endeavours to to engage her in caresses, which still are unreproved…he assaults her at once. Exploring hands encounter no defence…” It recalls the rape of Philomela in Ovid’s “Metamorphoses”. Tiresias shows empathy toward the woman’s situation - he alludes that this sort of perversion is nothing new in the world, but perhaps in this modern “wasteland”, it is our plight…it begs the question, how can we restore beauty, respect, and romance to intimacy?
This is a consequence of the modern era which prizes the glorification of war and conquest. Love has been corrupted and codes of conduct are ignored in favour of one’s own selfish pleasure.
I sat with this for quite a long time before reading more. And next, we see her reaction…
She turns and looks a moment in the glass,
Hardly aware of her departed lover;
Her brain allows one half-formed thought to pass:
“Well now that’s done: and I’m glad it’s over.”
When lovely woman stoops to folly and
Paces about her room again, alone,
She smooths her hair with automatic hand,
And puts a record on the gramophone.
Despite her experience, she tells herself, at least it is over after his depature, she looks in the mirror, paces about the room, fixes her hair cooly, and puts on music, in an attempt to forget and feel some sort of comfort again. Her nonchalance seems to say that she is used to being treated this way and does not feel her situation can be changed…that it is grievously, just the way the world is.
How utterly grim. Eliot masterfully evokes such depth of emotion and nudges the reader to reflect on their place in the world today…has it changed? Why do we neglect the state of things? Why not ask more of ourselves, of others, of humanity as a whole?
V. What the Thunder Said
What is the city over the mountains
Cracks and reforms and bursts in the violet air
Falling towers
Jerusalem Athens Alexandria
Vienna London
Unreal
He compares Vienna and London to three great, influential, and culturally significant cities which had fallen in the past: Jerusalem, Athens, Alexandria. It is as if to say even Europe is not immune to such tragedy as once was thought. In this new era, no city, however civilised or enlightened, is safe.
The final part brings some sense of relief. We are to look for a model of a more perfect way of being and of loving better.
In this decayed hole among the mountains
In the faint moonlight, the grass is singing
Over the tumbled graves, about the chapel
There is the empty chapel, only the wind’s home.
It has no windows, and the door swings,
Dry bones can harm no one.
Only a crock stood on the rooftree
Co co rico co co rico
In a flash of lightning. Then a damp gust
Bringing rain
Hopes and dreams of ideal love are dashed throughout this poem: so how then do we achieve it?
Eliot uses the imagery of prison and a keyholder. He looks to Sanskrit to give fuller meaning to his closing lines. The word Data means, “give”. Dayadhvam, “sympathise”. Damyata, “control”.
Dayadhvam: I have heard the key
Turn in the door once and turn once only
We think of the key, each in his prison
Thinking of the key, each confirms a prison
Only at nightfall, aethereal rumours
Revive for a moment a broken Coriolanus
DA
Damyata: The boat responded
Gaily, to the hand expert with sail and oar
The sea was calm, your heart would have responded
Gaily, when invited, beating obedient
To controlling hands
To restore humanity and bring about a change - to escape the wasteland, we must relinquish control (to controlling hands). This can be a god, spiritual guide or teaching, it can be a leader or group of learned leaders with a noble vision for the future, it could even be simply turning inward and exploring what you are made of and learning what your role in all of this is, as we seek ways to rid humanity of war and oppression and suffering. Ultimately, it is telling us to break from the current trajectory because to continue on this path will bring only bleaker days.
Lastly, he uses the allusion of the Fisher King from Arthurian legend; the one who protects the Holy Grail. After suffering an injury, he spends his days fishing, awaiting someone to replace him. As his life nears its end, it is time to put his affairs in order…
I sat upon the shore
Fishing, with the arid plain behind me
Shall I at least set my lands in order?
London Bridge is falling down falling down falling down
Poi s’ascose nel foco che gli affina (He hid himself in the fire which refines him)
Quando fiam ceu chelidon (when will I be as the swallow) — O swallow swallow
Le Prince d’Aquitaine à la tour abolie (The Prince of Aquitania, his tower in ruins)
These fragments I have shored against my ruins
Why then Ile fit you. Hieronymo’s mad againe.
Datta. Dayadhvam. Damyata.
Shantih shantih shantih
Though, “London Bridge is falling down…”, we are reminded that refinement is possible if we pursue it and are willing to make sacrifices for its sake. Poi s’ascose nel foco che gli affina is another nod to Dante; the final verse of Purgatorio 26.
The closing lines, “Shantih”, the peace which passes understanding, reiterate that through writing “The Wasteland”, Eliot is asking us to seek truth, to pursue peace and create a better world. Gracefully, it ends with an air of hope, as a prayer, despite the anxiety of earlier parts.
To me, it feels like he is imploring us that even if the answer lies cloaked in mystery or “beyond understanding”, it is the most worthwhile endeavour.
It gives meaning to life.
A noble pursuit
After being ravaged by war and dragged into a state of despair where love is corrupted, the most important thing we can spend our lives doing is exploring ways to restore truth, beauty, and honest love to the world. A century on, we can look back and see how in some ways, mankind has grown immensely. We have incredible access to information, life altering technology which provides convenience never before imagined, and advancements in healthcare which continue to awe. Yet, a sort of decay and degradation continues. It is marked by a walking away from a more well-defined sense of morality, a disrespect toward fellow humans, a polarisation of political opinion and growing collective anger and dissatisfaction, and a predilection for coasting through life as we ignore the tougher questions. Conventional wisdom says to be a pleasure seeker above all, which if not tread carefully, results in a lack of philosophical inquiry, and disregards the pursuit of metaphysical wisdom: we do not ask heartily enough, how then shall we live? Is there a way to bring about greater, enduring satisfaction?
There is so much to analyse. I am just scratching the surface, but from my vantage point, Eliot’s urgency to seek a better world beyond the wasteland, continues to be a noble pursuit, and it is one which I am happy to be an active participant in.