The Waste Land
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cause I associate him with the hooded figure in the passage of the disciples
to Emmaus in Part V. The Phoenician Sailor and the Merchant appear later;
also the “crowds of people,” and Death by Water is executed in Part IV. The
Man with Three Staves (an authentic member of the Tarot pack) I associate,
quite arbitrarily, with the Fisher King himself.
60. Cf. Baudelaire:
“Fourmillante cité, cité pleine de rêves,
“Où le spectre en plein jour raccroche le passant.”
63. Cf. Inferno III, 55–57:
“si lunga tratta
“di gente, ch’io non avrei mai creduto
“che morte tanta n’avesse disfatta.”
64. Cf. Inferno IV, 25–27:
“Quivi, secondo che per ascoltare,
“non avea pianto, ma’ che di sospiri,
“che l’aura eterna facevan tremare.”
68. A phenomenon which I have often noticed.
74. Cf. The Dirge in Webster’s White Devil.
76. V. Baudelaire, Preface to Fleurs du Mal.
i i . a g a m e o f c h e s s
77. Cf. Antony and Cleopatra, II, ii, l. 190.
92. Laquearia. V. Aeneid, I, 726:
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t h e w a s t e l a n d
“dependent lychni laquearibus aureis
incensi, et noctem flammis funalia vincunt.”
98. Sylvan scene. V. Milton, Paradise Lost, IV, 140.
99. V. Ovid, Metamorphoses, VI, Philomela.
100. Cf. Part III, l. 204.
115. Cf. Part III, l. 195.
118. Cf. Webster: “Is the wind in that door still?”
126. Cf. Part I, ll. 37, 48.
138. Cf. the game of chess in Middleton’s Women Beware Women.
i i i . t h e f i r e s e r m o n
176. V. Spenser, Prothalamion.
192. Cf. The Tempest, I, ii.
196. Cf. Marvell, “To His Coy Mistress.”
197. Cf. Day, Parliament of Bees:
“When of the sudden, listening, you shall hear,
“A noise of horns and hunting, which shall bring
“Actaeon to Diana in the spring,
“Where all shall see her naked skin . . .”
199. I do not know the origin of the ballad from which these lines are taken;
it was reported to me from Sydney, Australia.
202. V. Verlaine, “Parsifal.”
210. The currants were quoted at a price “carriage and insurance free to
London”; and the Bill of Lading etc. were to be handed to the buyer
upon payment of the sight draft.
218. Tiresias, although a mere spectator and not indeed a “character,” is yet the
most important personage in the poem, uniting all the rest. Just as the one-
eyed merchant, seller of currants, melts into the Phoenician Sailor, and
the latter is not wholly distinct from Ferdinand Prince of Naples, so all the
women are one woman, and the two sexes meet in Tiresias. What Tiresias
sees, in fact, is the substance of the poem. The whole passage from Ovid
is of great anthropological interest:
. . . Cum Iunone iocos et “maior vestra profecto est
Quam, quae contingit maribus,” dixisse, “voluptas.”
Illa negat; placuit quae sit sententia docti
Quaerere Tiresiae: venus huic erat utraque nota.
Nam duo magnorum viridi coeuntia silva
Corpora serpentum baculi violaverat ictu
Deque viro factus, mirabile, femina septem
Egerat autumnos; octavo rursus eosdem
Vidit et “est vestrae si tanta potentia plagae,”
Dixit, “ut auctoris sortem in contraria mutet,
Nunc quoque vos feriam!” percussis anguibus isdem
Forma prior rediit genetivaque venit imago.
t h e w a s t e l a n d
7 3
Arbiter hic igitur sumptus de lite iocosa
Dicta Iovis firmat; gravius Saturnia iusto
Nec pro materia fertur doluisse suique
Iudicis aeterna damnavit lumina nocte,
At pater onmipotens (neque enim licet inrita cuiquam
Facta dei fecisse deo) pro lumine adempto
Scire futura dedit poenamque levavit honore.
221. This may not appear as exact as Sappho’s lines, but I had in mind the
“longshore” or “dory” fisherman, who returns at nightfall.
253. V. Goldsmith, the song in The Vicar of Wakefield.
257. V. The Tempest, as above.
264. The interior of St. Magnus Martyr is to my mind one of the finest among
Wren’s interiors. See The Proposed Demolition of Nineteen City Churches
(P. S. King & Son Ltd.).
266. The Song of the (three) Thames-daughters begins here. From line 292
to 306 inclusive they speak in turn. V. Götterdämmerung, III, i: the
Rhine-daughters.
279. V. Froude, Elizabeth, Vol. I, ch. iv, letter of De Quadra to Philip of Spain:
“In the afternoon we were in a barge, watching the games on the river.
(The queen) was alone with Lord Robert and myself on the poop, when they
began to talk nonsense, and went so far that Lord Robert at last said, as I
was on the spot there was no reason why they should not be married if the
queen pleased.”
293. Cf. Purgatorio, V. 133:
“Ricorditi di me, che son la Pia;
“Siena mi fe’, disfecemi Maremma.”
307. V. St. Augustine’s Confessions: “to Carthage then I came, where a cauldron of unholy loves sang all about mine ears.”
308. The complete text of the Buddha’s Fire Sermon (which corresponds in im-
portance to the Sermon the Mount) from which these words are taken, will
be found translated in the late Henry Clarke Warren’s Buddhism in Trans-
lation (Harvard Oriental Series). Mr. Warren was one of the great pioneers
of Buddhist studies in the occident.
312. 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.
v . w h a t t h e t h u n d e r s a i d
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.
356. This is Turdus aonalaschkae pallasii, the hermit-thrush which I have heard in Quebec County. Chapman says ( Handbook of Birds of Eastern North America)
“it is most at home in secluded woodland and thickety retreats. . . . Its notes
are not remarkable for variety or volume, but in purity and sweetness of
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t h e w a s t e l a n d
tone and exquisite modulation they are unequaled.” Its “water-dripping
song” is justly celebrated.
359. The following lines were stimulated by the account of one of the Antarctic
expeditions (I forget which, but I think one of Shackleton’s): it was related
that the party of explorers, at the extremity of their strength, had the
constant delusion that there was one more member than could actually be
counted.
365–75. Cf. Hermann Hesse, Blick ins Chaos: “Schon ist halb Europa, schon
ist zumindest der halbe Osten Europas auf dem Wege zum Chaos, fährt
betrunken in heiligem Wahn am Abgrund entlang und singt dazu, singt
betrunken und hymnisch wie Dmitri Karamaso¤ sang. Ueber diese Lieder
lacht der Bürger beleidigt, der Heilige und Seher hört sie mit Tränen.”
401. “Datta, dayadhvam, damyata” (Give
, sympathise, control). The fable of the
meaning of the Thunder is found in the Brihadaranyaka-Upanishad, 5, I.
A translation is found in Deussen’s Sechzig Upanishads des Veda, p. 489.
407. Cf. Webster, The White Devil, V. vi:
“. . . they’ll remarry
“Ere the worm pierce your winding-sheet, ere the spider
“Make a thin curtain for your epitaphs.”
411. Cf. Inferno, XXXIII, 46:
“ed io sentii chiavar l’uscio di sotto
“all’orribile torre.”
Also F. H. Bradley, Appearance and Reality, p. 346.
“My external sensations are no less private to myself than are my thoughts
or my feelings. In either case my experience falls within my own circle,
a circle closed on the outside; and, with all its elements alike, every sphere
is opaque to the others which surround it. . . . In brief, regarded as an
existence which appears in a soul, the whole world for each is peculiar
and private to that soul.”
424. V. Weston: From Ritual to Romance; chapter on the Fisher King.
427. V. Purgatorio, XXVI, 148.
“‘Ara vos prec, per aquella valor
‘que vos guida al som de l’escalina,
‘sovegna vos a temps de ma dolor.’
Poi s’ascose nel foco che gli aªna.”
428. V. Pervigilium Veneris. Cf. Philomela in Parts II and III.
429. V. Gérard de Nerval, Sonnet “El Desdichado.”
431. V. Kyd’s Spanish Tragedy.
433. Shantih. Repeated as here, a formal ending to an Upanishad. “The Peace
which passeth understanding” is a feeble translation of the content of
this word.
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1 The Arcade of the Hofgarten, Munich, c. 1910 (Courtesy Stadtarchiv München)
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2 The Arcade Café in the Hofgarten, Munich, c. 1910 (Courtesy Stadtarchiv München)
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3 Aerial view of the Hofgarten, Munich, c. 1910 (Courtesy Stadtarchiv München)
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4 London Bridge, 1914 (© Museum of London)
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5 King William Street, intersection with Eastcheap, London, c. 1920. The statue of
King William IV was removed in 1935. (Courtesy Brian Girling Collection)
[To view this image, refer to
the print version of this title.]
6 St. Mary Woolnoth, London, as it appeared in Eliot’s time (From London County
Council, Proposed Demolition of Nineteen City Churches [London: London County Council, 1920])
[To view this image, refer to
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7 St. Mary Woolnoth, London, a more recent view (© Bob Mankeshaw LRPS,
www.imagesofengland.org.uk)
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the print version of this title.]
8 Lloyds Bank, Cornhill Street facade, London, c. 1920 (Courtesy Guildhall Library,
Corporation of London)
9 Map of the City, or Financial District, London (© Lawrence Rainey)
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10 Cannon Street Station and Hotel, London, c. 1910 (Courtesy National Railway
Museum, York)
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the print version of this title.]
11 Hotel Metropole, Brighton, c. 1910 (© The Royal Pavilion Libraries and Museums
[Brighton and Hove])
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the print version of this title.]
12 Lower Thames Street, exterior of St. Magnus Martyr, London, c. 1920 (From London
County Council, Proposed Demolition of Nineteen City Churches [London: London County Council, 1920])
[To view this image, refer to
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13 Lower Thames Street, exterior of St. Magnus Martyr, London, c. 1910 (Courtesy Brian Girling Collection)
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14 Interior of St. Magnus Martyr, London (Courtesy Kerry Downes)
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ourtesy Margate Local History Museum)
Margate Sands, Margate (C
15
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16 St. Michael Paternoster, London, 1920 (From London County Council, Proposed
Demolition of Nineteen City Churches [London: London County Council, 1920])
Editor’s Annotations to The Waste Land
Epigraph: “For on one occasion I myself saw, with my own eyes, the Cumaean
Sibyl hanging in a cage, and when some boys said to her, ‘Sibyl, what do you
want?’ she replied, ‘I want to die.’” This account is given by Trimalchio, a
character in the Satyricon, the satirical novel written by the Roman writer Petronius in the first century a.d. Trimalchio is a wealthy vulgarian who is
hosting a dinner which occupies the novel’s middle section; he is vying with
his guests, trying to surpass their tales of wonder, but merely muddles up
commonplace stories of Hercules and Ulysses before turning to his account
of the Cumaean sibyl. His anecdote, in other words, is partly a species of
braggadocio and may even be a lie, and it is partly an excuse for him to prove
that he can speak, as well as read, Greek.
There were as many as ten sibyls in the ancient world, prophetesses
whom the ancient Greeks and Romans consulted about the future, but the
most famous was the Cumaean Sibyl, whose oracular cavern was rediscov-
ered by archaeologists at the site of ancient Cumae near Naples in 1934.
Her prophecies were delivered in Greek hexameter verses inscribed on palm
leaves and placed at the mouth of her cave. If no one came to collect them,
they were scattered by the winds and never read. One collection of such
verses was put in the charge of a special priestly college in Rome, guarded in
subterranean chambers beneath the temple of Jove on the Capitoline Hill.
After they were destroyed in 83 b.c. when the temple burned, a new collec-
tion was made to replace them.
The Cumaean Sibyl figures prominently in Virgil’s Fourth Eclogue,
where she delivers a prophecy which Christians later interpreted as foreshad-
owing the birth of Christ. She is also described at length in Virgil’s Aeneid
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e d i t o r ’ s a n n o t a t i o n s t o l i n e s 1 – 7
VI, 1–155, where she tells Aeneas that he must find a golden bough in order
to enter the underworld. She also figures in Ovid’s Metamorphoses XIV, 101–
153, the account to which Trimalchio alludes. Promised by Apollo that she
could have one wish fulfilled, whatever it might be, she chose to live as many
years as the grains of sand she could hold in her hand; but she forgot to
choose eternal youth, and was condemned to grow ever older and more
shriveled.
In the prepublication version of The Waste Land the poem’s epigraph
was taken from Joseph Conrad’s Heart of Darkness (1900), as the narrator re-
counts the death of Kurtz: �
��Did he live his life again in every detail of desire,
temptation, and surrender during that supreme moment of complete knowl-
edge? He cried in a whisper at some image, at some vision—he cried out
twice, a cry that was no more than breath—‘The horror! the horror!’”
Ezra Pound, writing to Eliot on 24 January 1922 (incorrectly assigned
to 24 December 1921 by Valerie Eliot in LOTSE, 497), wrote: “I doubt if Conrad is weighty enough to stand the citation.” Eliot replied, probably on 26
January (incorrectly assigned by Valerie Eliot to [24? January]), “Do you mean
not use Conrad quot. or simply not put Conrad’s name to it? It is much the
most appropriate I can find, and somewhat elucidative.” Pound, responding
on 28 January, told Eliot to “Do as you like . . . re the Conrad; who am I to
grudge him his laurel crown.” See LOTSE, 504–505.
Dedication: “the better craftsman” in Italian. Eliot dedicates the poem to Ezra Pound with the phrase that registers Dante’s tribute to the Provençal poet
Arnaut Daniel, who flourished between 1180 and 1200; see Purgatorio XXVI,
117. The dedication first appeared in a presentation copy which Eliot gave
Pound in January 1923; it was published for the first time in 1925 when The
Waste Land was included in Poems, 1909–1925. For Pound’s role in shaping the poem, see the Introduction, 23–25.
The Burial of the Dead: “The Order for the Burial of the Dead” prescribes the
words and actions of a burial service within the Church of England; the text
appears in the Book of Common Prayer.
1–2: Critics often compare this account of April with the opening to the General
Prologue to The Canterbury Tales by Geo¤rey Chaucer (1343?–1400), which
adopts a more conventional and cheerful treatment of spring.
7 [a little life]: Perhaps an echo from “To Our Ladies of Death,” a poem by James
Thomson (1834–1882): “Our Mother feedeth thus our little life, / That we in
turn may feed her with our death.” Compare also Thomson’s, “The City of