“The Waste Land” is a fitting title for Eliot’s seminal piece, as the poem is a wilderness of allusions and footnotes; not only this, the poetry depicts the state of society as a wasteland, making the title both ambiguous and foreboding. In Ramazani’s introduction to “The Waste Land” he quotes Eliot saying, “In The Waste Land I wasn’t even bothering whether I understood what I was saying” (473). I believe that, the footnotes aside, the allusions and social criticism aside, “The Waste Land” stands alone as a tour de force from a master of verse. Ramazani failed to mention it in his introduction, however, I discovered that the working title of the poem was much different from the one the poet chose.
Facsimile Edition Titled: “He Do the Police in Different Voices”
The title, “He Do the Pole in Different Voices,” comes from a conversation within Charles Dickens’ novel Our Mutual Friend an it works with multiple functions: to imitate and grow from Dickens’, the great writer of Condition of England novels, as well as, to tie the many different voices of the poem to one central notion. It is the exploration of many voices singing one tune of music that makes this poem so wonderful.
In the second section, “A Game of Chess“* features conversation between two or more voices, maybe even different sets of voices; however, it feels like one consciousness throughout the section, even the entire poem. The dialogue allows for the poet to provide the tip of the iceberg and he then gives permission to the reader to dive under water and realize what the iceberg looks like in-full. Truthfully, the lines I found most powerful within the second section were lines 138 and 162- 162. The first– “Pressing lidless eyes and waiting for a knock upon the door” (478) — injects the reader to the moment, waiting for the whatever next comes through the door of culture, of society. Eliot uses arresting imagery to draw readers under the water of conversation to view the iceberg. The poem continues, “The chemist said it would be all right, but I’ve never been the same. / You are a proper fool, I said” (479). By this point in the section, dialogue has broken, there are no quotation marks around the sentences pelted out in between the bartender’s last call. The raw emotion spills out of this conversation, that broke the bounds of grammar and ‘society.’ “The chemist” was in reference to an abortion and the slight touch of applying that, and the response show the nature of humanity during the 1920s.
Just Eliot
Eliot’s section section in particular is an interesting example of how this poem works beyond allusion. The poem is banished in the eyes of students for it’s intimidating footnotes; Eliot quipped, “I have sometimes thought of getting rid of these notes; but now they can never be unstuck” (473). To publish The Waste Land as a separate book his editor required more text so Eliot prepared fifty-two notes to fill the space. While the inclusion of vast allusions helps to extend the argument made by the poem, and serves critics as an endless source of new readings, The Waste Land is truly revolutionary in its use of conversation within a dramatic monologue.
*A word cloud I made of “A Game of Chess.” It is sometimes interesting to see what words are used most often.*