The Waste Land: Difference between revisions
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{{Poem|author=T. S. Eliot|date=1922}} | |||
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Living nor dead, and I knew nothing, {{ln|40}} | Living nor dead, and I knew nothing, {{ln|40}} | ||
Looking into the heart of light,{{refn|'''the light''': cf. [[w:Dante Alighieri|Dante]]’s phrase from ''[[w:Divine Comedy#Paradiso|Paradiso]]'', xii 28: “''del cor dell’ una luci nuove''” (from the heart of one of the new lights).}} the silence.{{refn|[[w:Hyacinth (mythology)|Hyacinth]], loved by Apollo, was accidentally slain by the god, who then caused the flower bearing the youth’s name to grow from his blood. The hyacinth girl herself is forgotten by her lover—distracted by a vision of light. This is a reversal of Dante’s experience, who saw all of Paradise in [[w:Beatrice Portinari|Beatice]]’s eyes.}} | Looking into the heart of light,{{refn|'''the light''': cf. [[w:Dante Alighieri|Dante]]’s phrase from ''[[w:Divine Comedy#Paradiso|Paradiso]]'', xii 28: “''del cor dell’ una luci nuove''” (from the heart of one of the new lights).}} the silence.{{refn|[[w:Hyacinth (mythology)|Hyacinth]], loved by Apollo, was accidentally slain by the god, who then caused the flower bearing the youth’s name to grow from his blood. The hyacinth girl herself is forgotten by her lover—distracted by a vision of light. This is a reversal of Dante’s experience, who saw all of Paradise in [[w:Beatrice Portinari|Beatice]]’s eyes.}} | ||
''Öd’ und leer das Meer''.{{refn|''Tristan und Isolde'', III, verse 24 [E]: “Desolate and empty sea.” The dying Tristan hears this erroneous report as he waits for Isolde’s ship in the third act of [[w:Richard Wagner|Wagner]]’s opera. | ''Öd’ und leer das Meer''.{{refn|''Tristan und Isolde'', III, verse 24 [E]: “Desolate and empty sea.” The dying Tristan hears this erroneous report as he waits for Isolde’s ship in the third act of [[w:Richard Wagner|Wagner]]’s opera. The anguish of fractured love is added to the canvas. Tristan dies thinking Isolde will not come to him (though she is on her way).}} | ||
Madame Sosostris,{{refn|The name suggests an Egyptian fortuneteller that Eliot borrowed from [[w:Aldous Huxley|Aldous Huxley]]’s novel ''[[w:Crome Yellow|Crome Yellow]]''.}} famous clairvoyante,{{refn|Fear engendered by ignorance of the future comes next at a seance run by Madame Sosostris. She is both a debased form of the ancient Sibyl and a reflection of the diviners of Egypt (the name is masculine) who predicted the floods of the Nile by use of the Tarot. She reads the cards for her client, beginning with his own, “The drowned Phoenician Sailor,” the symbol of a fertility god annually thrown into the sea at the death of summer.}} | Madame Sosostris,{{refn|The name suggests an Egyptian fortuneteller that Eliot borrowed from [[w:Aldous Huxley|Aldous Huxley]]’s novel ''[[w:Crome Yellow|Crome Yellow]]''.}} famous clairvoyante,{{refn|Fear engendered by ignorance of the future comes next at a seance run by Madame Sosostris. She is both a debased form of the ancient Sibyl and a reflection of the diviners of Egypt (the name is masculine) who predicted the floods of the Nile by use of the Tarot. She reads the cards for her client, beginning with his own, “The drowned Phoenician Sailor,” the symbol of a fertility god annually thrown into the sea at the death of summer.}} | ||
Had a bad cold, nevertheless | Had a bad cold, nevertheless | ||
Is known to be the wisest woman in Europe, {{ln|45}} | Is known to be the wisest woman in Europe, {{ln|45}} | ||
With a wicked pack of cards.{{refn|I am not familiar with the exact constitution of the [[w:Tarot|Tarot]] pack of cards, from which I have obviously departed to suit my own convenience. [[w:The Hanged Man (Tarot card)|The Hanged Man]], a member of the traditional pack, fits my purpose in two ways: because he is associated in my mind with the Hanged God of [[w:James George Frazer|Frazer]], and because I associate him with the hooded figure in the passage of the disciples to [[w:Emmaus|Emmaus]] in | With a wicked pack of cards.{{refn|I am not familiar with the exact constitution of the [[w:Tarot|Tarot]] pack of cards, from which I have obviously departed to suit my own convenience. [[w:The Hanged Man (Tarot card)|The Hanged Man]], a member of the traditional pack, fits my purpose in two ways: because he is associated in my mind with the Hanged God of [[w:James George Frazer|Frazer]], and because I associate him with the hooded figure in the passage of the disciples to [[w:Emmaus|Emmaus]] in Part V. The Phoenician Sailor and the Merchant appear later; also the “crowds of people,” and Death by Water is executed in [[The Waste Land/4|Part IV]]. The Man with Three Staves (an authentic member of the Tarot pack) I associate, quite arbitrarily, with the [[w:Fisher King|Fisher King]] himself. [E] The Tarot pack of cards seems to have played a significant part in the ancient fertility rituals. Here it has degenerated into a fortune-teller’s property.}} Here, said she, | ||
Is your card, the drowned Phoenician Sailor, | Is your card, the drowned Phoenician Sailor, | ||
(Those are pearls that were his eyes.{{refn|'''Those . . . eyes''': From Ariel’s song to Prince Ferdinand in ''[[w:The Tempest|The Tempest]]'' (I.ii.398), touching on the “sea change” of King Alonzo, Ferdinand’s father, whom Ferdinand supposes to be drowned.}} Look!) | (Those are pearls that were his eyes.{{refn|'''Those . . . eyes''': From Ariel’s song to Prince Ferdinand in ''[[w:The Tempest|The Tempest]]'' (I.ii.398), touching on the “sea change” of King Alonzo, Ferdinand’s father, whom Ferdinand supposes to be drowned.}} Look!) | ||