Eliot's Notes

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(V. WHAT THE THUNDER SAID)
 
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Notes
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==Dedication, Title, and Overall Work==
  
Eliot's original notes have been supplemented by additional notations, which appear in green like so. I have taken several notes directly from M. H. Abrams et al., eds., The Norton Anthology of English Literature, 6th ed., vol. 2 (NY: Norton, 1993). I have also drawn heavily on A Guide to the Selected Poems of T.S. Eliot by B. C. Southam.
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Go to [[The Waste Land Text]]
The title probably originates with Malory's Morte d'Arthur. A poem strikingly similar in theme and language called Waste Land, written by Madison Cawein, was published in 1913.
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Eliot's original title for the poem was He do the Policemen in Different Voices, a reference to Our Mutual Friend by Charles Dickens, and is a comment on the skill of Sloppy in reading out Court cases from the newspapers.
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Epigraph I have seen with my own eyes the Sibyl hanging in a jar, and when the boys asked her "What do you want?" She answered,
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"I want to die."
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Petronius, Satyricon
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The Cumaean Sibyl was the most famous of the Sibyls, the prophetic old women of Greek mythology; she guided Aeneas through Hades in the Aeneid. She had been granted immortality by Apollo, but because she forgot to ask for perpetual youth, she shrank into withered old age and her authority declined.
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Dedication The better craftsman.
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Go to [[Dedication Annotations]]
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The better craftsman.
 
(Purgatorio xxvi, 117)
 
(Purgatorio xxvi, 117)
  
 
Not only the title, but the plan and a good deal of the incidental symbolism of the poem were suggested by Miss Jessie L. Weston's book on the Grail legend: From Ritual to Romance (Macmillan). Indeed, so deeply am I indebted, Miss Weston's book will elucidate the difficulties of the poem much better than my notes can do; and I recommend it (apart from the great interest of the book itself) to any who think such elucidation of the poem worth the trouble. To another work of anthropology I am indebted in general, one which has influenced our generation profoundly; I mean The Golden Bough; I have used especially the two volumes Adonis, Attis, Osiris. Anyone who is acquainted with these works will immediately recognize in the poem certain references to vegetation ceremonies.
 
Not only the title, but the plan and a good deal of the incidental symbolism of the poem were suggested by Miss Jessie L. Weston's book on the Grail legend: From Ritual to Romance (Macmillan). Indeed, so deeply am I indebted, Miss Weston's book will elucidate the difficulties of the poem much better than my notes can do; and I recommend it (apart from the great interest of the book itself) to any who think such elucidation of the poem worth the trouble. To another work of anthropology I am indebted in general, one which has influenced our generation profoundly; I mean The Golden Bough; I have used especially the two volumes Adonis, Attis, Osiris. Anyone who is acquainted with these works will immediately recognize in the poem certain references to vegetation ceremonies.
  
I. THE BURIAL OF THE DEAD
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==I. The Burial of the Dead==
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Go to [[The Waste Land Text]]
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Go to [["The Burial of the Dead" Annotations]]
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12.I am not Russian at all; I come from Lithuania, I am a real German
 
12.I am not Russian at all; I come from Lithuania, I am a real German
  
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V. Baudelaire, Preface to Fleurs du Mal.
 
V. Baudelaire, Preface to Fleurs du Mal.
  
II. A GAME OF CHESS
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==II. A Game of Chess==
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Go to [[The Waste Land Text]]
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Go to [["A Game of Chess" Annotations]]
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77. Cf. Antony and Cleopatra, II. ii. 190.  
 
77. Cf. Antony and Cleopatra, II. ii. 190.  
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172. Ophelia's last words in Hamlet, IV v.
 
172. Ophelia's last words in Hamlet, IV v.
  
III. THE FIRE SERMON
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==III. The Fire Sermon==
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Go to [[The Waste Land Text]]
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Go to [["The Fire Sermon" Annotations]]
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176. V. Spenser, Prothalamion.
 
176. V. Spenser, Prothalamion.
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309. From St. Augustine's Confessions again. The collocation of these two representatives of eastern and western asceticism, as the culmination of this part of the poem, is not an accident.
 
309. From St. Augustine's Confessions again. The collocation of these two representatives of eastern and western asceticism, as the culmination of this part of the poem, is not an accident.
  
IV. DEATH BY WATER
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==IV. DEATH BY WATER==
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Go to [[The Waste Land Text]]
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Go to [["Death by Water" Annotations]]
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This section is a version of the last seven lines of Eliot's earlier poem, Dans le Restaurant.
 
This section is a version of the last seven lines of Eliot's earlier poem, Dans le Restaurant.
V. WHAT THE THUNDER SAID
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==V. WHAT THE THUNDER SAID==
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Go to [[The Waste Land Text]]
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Go to [["What the Thunder Said" Annotations]]
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In the first part of Part V three themes are employed: the journey to Emmaus, the approach to the Chapel Perilous (see Miss Weston's book), and the present decay of eastern Europe.
 
In the first part of Part V three themes are employed: the journey to Emmaus, the approach to the Chapel Perilous (see Miss Weston's book), and the present decay of eastern Europe.

Latest revision as of 23:04, 11 September 2012

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