“Arrival at the Waldorf”: Living Between Imagination and Reality

In his essay “Imagination as Value”, Wallace Stevens presents a philosophy which guides us in the reading of his poetry. The poet puts forth the idea that “(T)he truth seems to be that we live in concepts of the imagination before the reason has established them." This imagination is not merely a realm of fantasy or escape, but rather a perspective and mindset that is ever present and gives meaning to the reality of the world in which we live. Imagination for Stevens is one of the great human powers, even genius, because it allows us the freedom of mind “to perceive the normal in the abnormal, the opposite of chaos in chaos.” According to Stevens, the closest we get to imagination is arts and letters, and as a poet, he engages in this pursuit which he compares to sensory activity in which the mind has the power to consider all possibilities of basic images and emotions.

In Steven’s opinion, imagination “…enables us to live our own lives. (W)e have it because we do not have enough without it.” Through the arts man reaches the pinnacle of imagination and in so doing helps to create reality. In this sense, imagination and reality are connected, as we live in the mind that creates beauty, justice, and happiness until reason may ultimately adopt them as reality and normality. Reality is the result of the imagination’s efforts to shape our world, a perpetual activity in which man attempts to find imaginatively satisfying ways to perceive the world around him. As such, Stevens labels reason as “the methodizer of the imagination” in which the latter is organized by and becomes reality.

A special quality of imagination is that it allows us to look both forwards and backwards, using different powers of the mind in each direction. In looking ahead to the future, to imagine what might be or what we would want to happen, one uses creative energy with the hopes of fulfilling expectations or dreams to form a physical reality. In looking back to the past, to remember what we already experienced or what already happened, one uses reproductive power with the hopes of refreshing memories of a physical reality that are now only present in our imagination. This latter use of imagination is the one employed in Steven’s poem “Arrival at the Waldorf.”

In the poem’s first line, the dichotomy between imagination and reality is established immediately. The narrator has already returned from “actual” Guatemala, the place that is real for him, faraway and “alien”, existing in the physical and “green.” In both its foreign and natural state, Guatemala appeals greatly to the speaker. Now, however, “back at the Waldorf”, the physical reality of Guatemala is what is alien to him and revisited only in his imagination. With “all approaches gone, being completely there,” he cannot return to Guatemala and has indeed fully returned physically if not mentally to New York City. The narrator will use the force of his imagination to recreate the natural life, green lushness, and people of that tropical setting in contrast to the artificial one at the hotel.

In his new reality he senses the “wild country of the soul” found at the hotel. The Waldorf is not one’s home, perhaps rendering him like a lost soul, a poor substitute for the place where one feels like he belongs. Stevens uses the word “wild” three times in the first six lines of his poem, and in each the connotation is of a negative nature, implying that the speaker is unhappy with the present reality of his world. He writes “(W)here the wild poem is a substitute/” For the woman one loves or ought to love,…” and “(O)ne wild rhapsody a fake for another.” Instead of the strong physical and emotional sense implied of loving a woman as he did or perhaps saw others do in Guatemala, at the Waldorf there is only the artificial and inadequate verse of the poem or song one might hum with the orchestra to take its place. Neither the words of the poem nor the music of the rhapsody evokes the mood or sensual feeling that was left behind in Guatemala. Upon his arrival back at the hotel, the speaker remarks about the distance he feels from his surroundings and the people therein. “You touch the hotel the way you touch moonlight/ Or sunlight…”, from a great distance, looking at them but not feeling their intimacy. In this reality there is only verse, words that do not connect people for “men (are) remoter than mountains…” and “(W)omen invisible in music and motion and color.” After having experienced the reality of Guatemala, all other realities pale in comparison for the speaker.

As America’s greatest poet of the imagination, Wallace Stevens portrays a speaker in this poem who finds himself in the intersection of reality and imagination. Only through the artifice of imagination will he be able to filter and influence the reality in which he now lives, thereby making it more palatable an experience in the present and more potent a memory from the past.

Imagination as a Blackbird

Wallace Stevens is quite renowned for his emphasis on the imagination. He utilizes his own imagination constantly in his numerous written works, and stresses the importance of others using theirs while attempting to understand his. In one such work, “Thirteen Ways of Looking at a Blackbird,” his theme of imagination and deeper thought is constant throughout the work. This poem in particular is useful when reading Stevens’ “Imagination as Value.” “Thirteen Ways of Looking at a Blackbird” serves as a perfect example when trying to understand the applications of many of his points in the essay.

To begin, we must examine parts II and III:

II
I was of three minds,
Like a tree
In which there are three blackbirds.
III

The blackbird whirled in the autumn winds.
It was a small part of the pantomime.

These lines depict a feeling of confusion and indecisiveness. Being of three minds alludes to the famous phrase of ‘being of two minds,’ meaning, having two different pulling emotions or thoughts. Additionally, the blackbird was ‘whirled’ in the wind, not the master of his own course, nor heading in any one particular direction. These allusions refer to Steven’s definition of imagination, as he states in “Imagination as Value, saying, “It does not seem possible to say of the imagination that it has a single characteristic which of itself gives it a certain single value as,” (133). This would suggest that while the blackbird can represent many different things in Stevens’ poem, the imagination is certainly a viable option.

Later, in verses VI and VII, the reader is presented with highly depictive adjectives and word choices. It is impossible to read them without imagining the images they describe:

VI
Icicles filled the long window
With barbaric glass.
The shadow of the blackbird
Crossed it, to and fro.
The mood
Traced in the shadow
An indecipherable cause.
VII

O thin men of Haddam,
Why do you imagine golden birds?
Do you not see how the blackbird
Walks around the feet
Of the women about you?

In fact, Stevens even uses the word imagine in the VII stanza, emphasizing to his readers that they must stretch their minds in order to fully appreciate his work. Again, in “Imagination as Value,” he states, “It is the value of imagination. The poet tries to exemplify it, in part, as I have tried to exemplify it here, by identifying it with an imaginative activity that diffuses itself throughout our lives.” (149). And in truth, without making the reading of this poem into an ‘imaginative activity’ there is no way to truly understand and appreciate his words, and the process that experiencing them begins.

Finally, in stanza IX, Stevens writes:

IX
When the blackbird flew out of sight,
It marked the edge
Of one of many circles

To me, this is the most piercing stanza in the entire work. Here, Stevens addresses perspective head on. In “Imagination as Reason,” Stevens says, “But, given another mind, given the mind of a man of strong powers, accustomed to thought, accustomed to the essays of the imagination, and the whole imaginative substance changes. It is as if one could say that the imagination lives as the mind lives,” (151). This poem in and of itself is experimentation with perception. Stevens provides a somewhat vague narrative, and the reader may choose how to interpret his words. This is an exercise that Stevens himself relishes, for it is the ‘imaginative activity’ that he endorses so thoroughly. “Thirteen Ways of Looking at a Blackbird” is a marriage between perception and imagination, and the interplay between the two. In fact, even in the title, Stevens warns his readers of multifaceted work that they are about to being; ‘thirteen’ itself is a large number, and he provides thirteen completely different and probing interpretations of a blackbird. This work perfectly embodies the use of imagination as a value.

Lessons From Cather

As a college student, I have had to learn to balance my life choices between the quixotic and the pragmatic. Do I sign up for a class covering a topic I want to learn more about, or do I choose a course that I’m required to take to fulfill my graduation requirements? Should I spend all day in the bookstore looking for the perfect CliffsNotes tome to study from, or do I stay in my dorm and study the notes I already have? Having to deal with these questions on a daily basis at school has taught me that if I always yield to my impulses to spend my time on minimally productive pursuits, I won’t get as much out of my limited time during the day as I would otherwise. On the other hand, if the only criterion I use to decide what I do every day is whether it’s time-efficient, I won’t take any chance on an activity or cause that might broaden my intellectual horizons or make me a better person. So, my experiences making these decisions gave me a good background for understanding one of the underlying themes in Willa Cather’s novel, “The Professor’s House”, about the choice between making quixotic and pragmatic decisions.

For example, Professor St. Peter is a man primarily concerned with leading a life of practicality and expediency, even going so far as to only allow his family a certain amount of time with him, so he could devote himself to his work. In her book, Cather writes ”Two evenings of the week he spent with his wife and daughters… He had Saturdays and Sundays, of course, and on those days he worked like a miner under a landslide… He had burned his candle at both ends to some purpose—he had got what he wanted” (Cather 18-19). This passage establishes the Professor as a man of great capacity for planning and ensuring everything in his life happens according to plan. As a man of great pragmatism, St. Peter seeks to live a life of tranquility, shunning any opportunity his life offers him for pursuits he deems too spontaneous. For instance, he doesn’t deviate from his routine even when his daughter gets stung by a bee, viewing her as “a square-dealing, dependable little creature… she was to play in the garden all morning, and was not on any account to disturb him in his study” (Cather 73). St. Peter feels content with how his life is organized, because it makes him feel secure and successful—however, the only person who ever made him question his frame of mind was Tom Outland.

When Professor St. Peter meets Tom Outland, he is struck by his affinity for being wonderful and brilliant, entertaining his daughters with tales of his vagabond childhood. Furthermore, Tom is everything St. Peter is not—he spends copious amounts of time playing with his then-young daughters, enjoying “the prettiness and freshness and gaiety of the little girls as if they were flowers” (106). Outland is quixotic where St. Peter is pragmatic—though Outland has the same amount of intellect as St. Peter does, he expresses it through his passion for things that are beautiful and wonderful, rather than merely what will keep his life running smoothly.

Furthermore, Outland’s paradigm helps St. Peter learn to cherish what brings joy to his life, instead of just valuing what will further his career. For example, the Professor learns from Tom that a person can “keep affection and advancement far apart… [and] must never on any account owe any material advantage to his friends” (151), which is an attitude unlike what he has learned as a professor concerned with navigating the difficult world of faculty politics and a loveless marriage. Tom’s friendship teaches the Professor that his life doesn’t have to just be about devotion to pragmatic concerns, but can include a respect for elements in his life that bring him happiness and closer relationships.

I Love You, Man

While reading Willa Cather’s novel, The Professor’s House, that among many other themes discussed in class, there was a love affair of sorts taking place between Godfrey and Tom. At first it struck me as odd, that two heterosexual males could have such deep feelings for one another. In this case we focus more on Godfrey St. Peter’s love for Tom. As I read further I realized that this relationship was terribly reminiscent of what is today called a “Bromance”. Defined by urban dictionary as “the complicated love and affection shared by two straight males” or more specifically “The intense love shared between heterosexual males. A form of male bonding and usually invisible to the naked eye. This bond is normally only shared between two males that have a deeper understanding of each other, in a way no woman could ever realize.”

As one of St. Peter’s students, Tom was one of the few who left a mark in his life. He saw his desire to learn and passion for life and also saw in Tom his youthful self in Kansas. Their student-teacher relationship soon turned into a very special friendship, one that would change the professors life forever. It can be said that Godfrey loved Tom in a way that he did not anyone else. He found solace in Tom, they connected on a level that, throughout the novel, becomes clear that no one else could with Godfrey.

Throughout the beginning of the novel, we are given hints to Tom’s role in the professor’s life. We get a sense of the void left in Godfrey’s life due to Tom’s death, but it isn’t until the middle/end that we get the full effect. I think that the void just began to grow bigger and bigger as time went by instead of healing. The Professor had a hard time letting go because his life was changing in ways he was not ready to handle causing him to constantly look backward at the days he wished still existed.

It could be said that the bromance between Outland and St. Peter began when they became friends, but I believe that the friendship became concrete after Outland’s death, as strange as that may sound. It seems that the problems that occurred in Godfrey’s family pushed him to become a bit more nostalgic and to hold on to Outland’s memory even more. Godfrey was a man who had high expectations and morals and the this affinity for society and wealth that his family picked up is seen a betrayal to him. To Godfrey, Tom represents the old life he lead. He admired how Tom treated his girls and how they were fascinated by him. He saw Tom and being pure and good and far from obsessed with the materialism and money that his family is now consumed by. It becomes clear that Godfrey’s isolation is mainly his way of holding on to the good, which is the past, and avoiding the avaricious which has become the present. St peter had a hard time understanding the women in his life and this caused him to turn to Tom. He wanted the days back when someone understood him, and what he wanted out of life. Godfrey is disappointed by the money that has been introduced to his daughter’s life and what it has done to his family. His way of dealing with it is basically by distancing himself from his family and grasping on to whatever he has left of “the good times”, mainly Tom.

Cather's "Lost Generation"

“The lost generation”, a term coined by Gertrude Stein, acts as a critique on the pre and post WWI society of the 1920’s. Stein, alongside other Modernist writers such as Faulkner and Hemingway, explored this notion of a “lost generation” living in an insignificant world. To them, they were members of a struggling modern age, trying to find meaning in a context that was virtually meaningless. Perhaps we can say the same thing about Willa Cather in The Professor’s House, a text that deals with problems, incoherencies, catastrophes, and textual breaks. These fragmentations and losses found in the narrative can be viewed as a kind of critique or commentary of Cather’s time, perhaps a time she considered empty of meaning.

The most blatant topic of loss manifests in Godfrey’s character. We witness as his family, marriage, and homes all destabilize, but most importantly, as he copes with the death of Tom, his favorite student. Godfrey’s damaged character, in this way, represents a broken reality, and reflects the losses of modernity. Fragmentation exists in the text’s form as well. The chapter of “Tom Outland’s Story” acts as a fracture between its surrounding two chapters, breaking the narrative’s general flow. While many have criticized Cather for this structural inconsistency in the text, disrupting both its narrative discourse and textual form, it actually functions as a reflection of modern society’s disruption and disorder. World War I and the vanishing Cliff City’s people are also a part of the theme of loss and breakage. 20^th century Modernism, to Cather, greatly lacks inherent significance.

While Cather may be criticizing the Modernist era, she is also acting as a true Modernist author while doing so. Modernist literature involves a whole lot of cynicism, advocates a sense of mistrust among its readers, and seeks to depart from traditional ideas. By commenting on Modernism through the use of literary breaks and fragmentations, Cather engenders a sense of apprehension and distrust among readers, a reaction not uncommon among readers of Modernism.

Yin and Yang: Two Halves of Life

Literature, good literature, ought to enrich a person’s life. Literature holds a mirror up to humanity, unabashedly showing us our flaws and imperfections. It is much easier to talk about other people than it is ourselves, more so when those people are fictitious. But talking about those other people assuages our own fears and can be cathartic. Cather’s mirror in The Professor’s House shows the reader’s own feelings in an easier to talk about manner, laying bare a usual “sweep it under the rug” approach to the banality of life and instead encouraging the reader to embrace the bland.

At the outset of the novel, the professor, St. Peter, yearns for his former house. The family has just moved and yet he still keeps the house. As the reader finds out more about his current family life, the story is suddenly interrupted with the intrusion of an extended back flash. Tom Outland was very close with St. Peter and supposed to be his son-in-law. From St. Peter’s eyes, those times seem like the best of his life.

As the story closes, St. Peter wakes up to realize “the long anticipated coincidence had happened…the storm had blown the stove out and the window shut” such that the house was filling with gas. Aside from posing an interesting legal question if failing to actively save his own life creates culpability for of killing himself, his flirtation with death stuns the reader. How far must one travel down the road of memory to the point when the present seems futile?

Ultimately, St. Peter is saved by Augusta. She happened to come over during the storm and found him on the floor. She supposes he “must have got up and tried to get to the door before [he was] overcome” and passed out from the gas. Then, looking at Augusta, he realizes she lives life fully. Augusta “wasn’t at all afraid to say things that were heavily, drearily true … [after assisting with deaths and funerals] her manner of speaking about it made death seem less uncomfortable”, less frightening. There is a truth about her missing from the professor.

When he realizes why Augusta comforts him, he realizes what he lacks from his own life: namely, life. St. Peter “never learned to live without delight” since he always searches for happiness. But life is not wholly happy. It can be, but that is not the truth of life. Finally it “occurred to him that he might have to live” without the façade of delight, but the truth of what is under that façade as well. His conscious state, after surviving the incident with the gas, “had let something go--and it was gone: something very precious, that he could not consciously have relinquished, probably”. As he reflects on his brush with death, St. Peter’s conscious catches up with his subconscious, allowing him to live completely. The deepest part of him, the part he lacked access to, knew life retained value even after the glamour fades and the best years are behind. Therefore he subconsciously got up from the chair to save himself and live.

The book celebrates all of life. Cather implores the reader to embrace the mundane aspects of life, as well as the good. Living like an ostrich who keeps his head in the ground is not good enough. It is the less liked parts of life that make life good. Though this book may be about accepting the minutiae and normal domestic rituals, the reader cannot overlook the deep nostalgia in its pages when the professor recalls the past. Therefore, to pair the mundane and nostalgia, the book is an exhortation to enjoy everything. The bad exists to emphasize the good while the good uplifts from the bad. Instead of just being born back ceaselessly to the past by memory, as Fitzgerald wirtes, his boat is finally able to “beat on” to life, in its entirety.

Significance and Parallel between the Study and Blue Mesa

In The Professor’s House, there are many parallels between the Professor and Tom Outland. Although their lives, thoughts, and upbringing are vastly different from each other there are significant commonalities between them, such as the need for a place of their own to be used for some kind of personal awakening. For the Professor, it is his study which he is so deeply obsessed with, while for Tom his place of refuge is Blue Mesa. To me, both places seem to be used as a sort of sanctuary for its respective dweller.

In the professor’s case, he spends the majority of the novel sequestered away, in the simple third floor study of his old residence. Though the Professor’s family has already moved into the new home made just for them, he goes to great lengths to preserve his old study. He goes so far as to continue paying rent for the entire house just so he could occupy this small space. Furthermore, he goes so far to preserve it just as it was and not change it in anyway. He refuses to remove anything from the study or make any changes to it. As the story progresses, the Professor lingers in his old workspace and spends more and more amounts of time there, removing himself from the daily routine of his friends and family.

The room becomes a place where he can disappear, and it comforts him in a way that his family and friends cannot. “It was the one place in the house where he could get isolation, insulation from the engaging drama of domestic life” (18). Furthermore, the space is used as a sanctuary where he can envision his most idealized self, and discover “the mystery and importance” (57) of who he truly is. The study may be a physical, material place, yet the feelings and emotions it evokes for the professor is anything but physical, rather a spiritual force. For the professor the study enables his creative prosperity where he can think of and craft all his writing and creative endeavors.

Similarly, Tom seems to find a similar type of sanctuary in Blue Mesa. Although the spiritual awe and appeal of a place like Blue Mesa is more obvious than the simple one-roomed study, the value for Tom is much like the study’s value for the Professor. In both of these places there is a lack of intrusion by the social world and the characters find something they need which is not offered by anyone or anywhere else. Just as the study was a place solely for the Professor, the mesa had not been visited in 100s of years and Tom used it as a place of his own. They are both places of isolation and personal discovery. Both Tom and the Professor seem to be missing some kind of spiritual meaning in their lives, which they strive to find and these spaces fulfill that void by giving places and objects significance that only they can relate to.

Although both places are vastly different in their appearance and physical nature, they both serve a similar purpose for each respective dweller. Both are places where the characters can be alone and find themselves by being introspective. The isolation in each place provides the characters a sanctuary to think and be contemplative.

Godfrey St. Peter's Loss of House and Identity

At the beginning of the novel, we learn a lot about Professor Peter St. Peter’s character. He is excitedly preparing for his future, he is strong in his beliefs and ideals and he is oddly attached to his old house in which he is in the process of moving out of. He and his wife are in the process of moving into a new, bigger house with all the modern conveniences awaiting his arrival. His attachment to the old house is so strong he even has a particular order and place for every object in the room which mustn’t be changed. At the conclusion of the story, St. Peter’s personality completely transforms and he is no longer apathetic to his morals and principles he used to hold near and dear to his heart. He abandons everything that made him who he is. This can be seen throughout the story as he drifts away from his family. St. Peter’s loss of identity is a result of his loss of his old home, symbolizing the old and simpler life he used to live.

With the big move on the rise, Peter St. Peter has become detached from his family and apathetic toward his principles. In the new house he and his wife decide to have separate bedrooms and bathrooms. St. Peter depicts his family’s imperfection as being cause for his solitude. But it is St. Peter unwillingness to change and adapt that is the root of his problems. Lillian tells him this when she says, “One must go on living, Godfrey. But it wasn’t the children who came between us” (78). We see St. Peter is truly the cause of their fading relationship because he is uninterested in anyone’s values. This is also seen when the family gets together for a nice dinner out, he is no longer excited to see his family. At dinner he becomes mute and passive, distraught by the family’s new obsession with money and the materialistic world. Before the big move, Lillian was attracted to his vivacious and eager personality, which is the exact opposite of Peter’s new somber attitude. While Lillian notices Peter’s change, Peter can’t help but think about the drastic change of his family members. His daughters were once innocent and untainted from the world now, obsessed with money and his wife who was attracted to his youthful exhilaration which is now expressed onto Marsellus.

For St. Peter, the attachment to the old house becomes, as the novel progresses, and as is evident even from this first chapter, a symbol for St. Peter’s attachment to the past itself and the simpler, modest life they used to life. As a historian, this emotion is perhaps fitting. The Professor is attached not only to the house and its imperfections, but to his work room in the house and to the very dress forms his sewing lady has used to construct dresses for his wife and daughters over the years. At the end of the book, the family takes a trip to France and Peter stays behind. Spending time away from his family and back in the old home, Godfrey realizes how unhappy he is with his "new” life brought on by the new family values and new house. He begins to question how he will survive the change.

When Godfrey lived in old house he is grounded in his beliefs and refused to submit to the social changes along with his family. However, the new house has changed the entire family, Lillian , the daughters and sons-in-law have become much more materialistic and modern while Godfrey is distraught by the new modern life he becomes passive. His new attitude has completely taken over his life, he even passively awaits death as he sits in the study as the room fills with gas. Not only did Godfrey lose his home along with his modest and simple lifestyle, he also lost his identity; his values and principles abandoned along with the abandoned ,empty house.

The Specter of Tom Outland- The Good, The Bad and The Evil

In The Professor’s House, Cather weaves a web of interlocking relationships that dominates the novel, emanating from a single character who so significantly affects all the lives he touches. In his central role, Tom Outland seems to be a specter, arriving out of thin air from another land, bearing gifts and tales and developing scintillating and fulfilling relationships within the St. Peter family, only to be the cause of the erosion of the entire family with his just as sudden disappearance out of their lives to another land from which he never returns.

Tom’s relationship starts with Professor St. Peter who speaks of two romances he has had in his life. The first was of the heart with his wife Lillian whose interest in art and life as well as her charm and intellect enthralled him. They rushed to marry and built a fulfilling life for their family in Hamilton. Tom’s arrival marks his second romance, and this latter one completely eclipses his marriage. Initially Tom is a welcome protégé of the St. Peter family. Lillian never finds fault with him and takes care of his boarding and clothing needs, and Rosamond and Kathleen play with him and live out his adventures. Later Rosamond and Tom become romantically involved and engaged. All is good, and Godfrey gets much pleasure from seeing Tom as part of his family.

The situation turns bad two years later when Lillian’s jealousy of the special connection between her husband and Tom starts to grow. When Godfrey makes Tom his private companion, secluding them in his study, Lillian withdraws her favor, and Tom eventually stops coming to the house. During the summer after Tom’s graduation, he and the professor are sole and constant companions, bonding in their stories and daily activities. Tom’s tale of his early life and adventures on the mesa provides the richness and authenticity for Godfrey’s volumes. In this romance of the mind, the professor’s vicarious experiences and pleasure in Tom’s story gives him a renewal of youth and infatuation with his student. Two years later they spend the summer together, solidifying their relationship through their exploration of the Southwest, followed by a third summer in Old Mexico. Plans for the summer of 1914 are delayed, the war comes, and Tom is gone, forever, leaving an aching hole in the Professor’s heart and unrealized dreams in his mind. After two good relationships in his life, St. Peter loses one and has permanently spoiled the other.

Tom’s negative effect on the St. Peter family is felt even from his grave. Before he left for the war Tom willed all his rights from his patent to Rosamond. The new wealth that its profits bring to the Marselluses wreaks havoc on the St. Peter family. As children, Kathleen always adored her older sister, and this feeling remained until Louie became engaged to Rosamond, who, in Kathleen’s opinion, forgot their Tom too quickly. Rosamond also becomes estranged from her sister who still preserves Tom’s memory, as does her father, from the innocent and fantastic time in their lives. Kitty accuses her sister of viewing Tom as chemicals and dollars and cents, and their ever widening social and economic situations create great tension on both sides. Rosamond angrily refuses to give any of her unwanted furnishings to her sister, and Scott blackballs Louie for the Arts and Letters club. Godfrey is pained and disillusioned by Rosamond’s extravagances in Chicago and her failing to offer to pay his way on the trip she insisted he accompany her on. Her lack of fairness and empathy in refusing to share any of her profits with the needy and ill Professor Crane pains him greatly. He despairs that Tom’s fortune has become an evil that has corrupted his family. After a solitary summer daydreaming about his past, the professor is rudely reawakened to the return of his family. In his pain he feels that he has fallen out of his place within his family and must get away from everything he had once cared for so intensely. When his half-hearted attempt to commit suicide is foiled, he resolves to live his life without the joy he knew long ago.

In structuring the book, it is symbolic that Cather placed the three parts of the story as she did. In Book One, “The Family”, we are told the moving was over and done. It soon becomes apparent that more than moving to a new home has occurred, that there was a major change in their once happy lives that has caused them to move on from what they once had. While introduced within this first book, it is not until Book Two, “Tom Outland’s Story”, that we learn the full tale of his past. Through their relationships with Tom, so much pleasure and profit were brought to some, yet pain and emptiness to others, all at different times in their mutual lives. Tom’s Book Two breaks the chronology of the story from Book One to Book Three, just as his part in their lives breaks the St. Peter family apart. In the final book, “The Professor”, Godfrey is all alone, broken off from his family of the first part by Tom who appears in the middle. He is at the edge of suicidal despair, the result of the loss of the good relationships he once had in his life and their replacement by the bad feelings of apathy he now has for his family and the evil influences of materialism in their lives.

Close to Home- Cather and her Characters

Willa Cather, born in 1873 and died in1947, is famous for many great accomplishments. Among them are her first publication, the biography of Mary Baker Eddy, her talent and dedication as a teacher, educating in Latin, algebra and English, and of course, her brilliant novels covering themes like the Midwest spirit and friendship. However, other than brief accounts of her professional life and mere tidbits regarding her personal life, very little is known about the person that is Willa Cather.

The identity of an author often greatly influences how his or her writing is to be interpreted. One fiercely debated instance regarding the interpretation of a theme arises in Cather’s The Professor’s House. The deeply important friendship of Tom Outland, a former student of the protagonist, and Professor St. Peter. The question, of course, was whether the two had been involved romantically, or whether they were simply very close friends with a profound, mutual respect for one another. Countless scholars have pored over excerpts from her novel, attempting to determine the nature of this relationship, at times, looking into Cather’s personal life to determine the answers.

As a young student in the University of Nebraska, Cather is known to have not only disguised herself as a man in dress and hairstyle, but also through her name. Cather opted to go by the masculine name “William” instead of her given “Willa.” Although this describes nothing of her sexual orientation, at the very least, it does depict Cather’s more natural inclination towards men than women. This is actually quite telling as to how Cather could compose a novel through the eyes and mouth of a man, she herself obviously being a woman. Because she identified more easily with men than women, she could brilliantly portray a man through writing; as a man she felt far more able to truly express her own voice.

Also, Cather is known for nurturing long and significant friendships with women, including Louise Pound, Isabelle McClung, and of course, her roommate for the last 39 years of her life, Edith Lewis. This last friendship in particular has long fascinated scholars, and forced them to question her sexual identity and the implications it may have in either direction. Janet Sharistanian has said, “Cather did not label herself a lesbian nor would she wish us to do so, and we do not know whether her relationships with women were sexual. In any case, it is anachronistic to assume that if Cather's historical context had been different, she would have chosen to write overtly about homoerotic love." While her words prove inconclusive as to her sexual orientation, one thing she does lay to rest for certain is whether or not it matters.

An intensely private person, Cather has destroyed many personal papers and letters, removing the public’s ability to pass judgment or analyze that which was not theirs to examine. However, the slight glimpses we do merit into Cather’s life do prove telling about her novel, The Professor’s House, and Professor St. Peter in general. Cather is often praised for her apt portrayal of a man. While she is certainly deserving of such praise, I’d like to argue that perhaps it was less difficult for Cather to create Godfrey St. Peter than perhaps it was to create Kathleen or Rosamond. Like her, St. Peter was an educator, a lover of knowledge. He also was “part American farmers,” and Cather is famed for her beautiful description of her Nebraska life. Most importantly, St. Peter took great joy in his friendship with Tom Outland. He was able to get to know himself better through Outland, and he honed in on the traits and qualities he found most important, helping him to develop into a better man. Perhaps Cather drew on her own significant relationships with her friends, Edith Lewis being one. After my exploration of the identity of Willa Cather, I find that as enlightening as certain aspects of her personality are, not one of them change her novel. The relationship between Tom and Godfrey can either be analyzed or taken at face value, but neither interpretation can be based on Cather’s own life. She more likely than not did model St. Peter on aspects of her own character judging by certain parallels, but ultimately, the relationship of the two men can not be analyzed through Cather herself.

Cather's Dichotomous Nature

At first glance Willa Cather's The Professor's House does not appear to be from the Modernist era. However, upon further examination one realizes that Cather is criticizing materialism, which was typical of the 1920's. She also shows signs of the classic stream of consciousness with the Professor's flashbacks to his times with Tom. In order to elaborate upon her critique, Cather establishes dichotomies. To add even more depth to the various dichotomies, she explores them through her characters and their personalities. Two of the main influencing juxtapositions are that of Augusta and Father Duchene and the Professor and Tom.

Augusta and Father Duchene are both religious Catholics who have spent their lives being invested in the church. Cather introduces this similarity by presenting Augusta in the context of religious holidays. Every time she is mentioned in the novel a holiday or clarification of some religious principle occurs. The same idea applies to Father Duchene in that he is always focused on Tom's Latin capabilities. Cather's reasoning for such a representation is to cause the reader to notice a parallel among these two characters. Additionally, Augusta and Father Duchene are limited unto themselves, rather they give advice and have an influence on others. Their relationships with the Professor and Tom respectively are also meant to draw a comparison between them. Cather uses the inherent similarities to further comment on the dichotomy of Catholicism and Modernist society. Augusta and Father Duchene represent what modern society should have been, to wit selfless and humanitarian. The actions of the other characters represent the Modernist society, namely materialistic and selfish. Therefore, Cather intentionally sets up the structure of Father Duchene and Augusta to be similar so that she can comment on the misplacement of focus by society.

The Professor and Tom have a close relationship, so much so that Lillian is jealous and the Professor still thinks about Tom regularly after his death. Their closeness arises from the fact that the Professor and Tom are so similar personality wise. Both the Professor and Tom value privacy to the utmost degree that it even shuts those closest to them away. Professional success is hinged upon maintaining privacy and clarity. By juxtaposing the like ways of the Professor and Tom, Cather is able to comment the dichotomy of privacy and society. She enables herself to show both sides of the spectrum. The dangers of seclusion are represented by the Professor and Tom and the dangers of being too rooted in society like Rosamond and Louie or the family in Washington Tom boards with. The Professor and Tom do not always have the same outlook or values. For example, Tom is the young idealist who has a certain impatience with his experiments and life. The Professor, on the other hand, is a pragmatist who is resided to the fact that his best days in life are over and monotony has begun. Cather uses this contrast to convey our progression from a young idealist into a mature pragmatist throughout our lifespan.

To conclude, Cather does a great job of synthesizing her characters into dichotomies, some of which later develop into themes. She wants the characters to be round and not flat and one dimensional. The main focus of her commentary is toward society and their shortcomings. Cather explores her characters in pairs to create a dichotomy that produces meaning. Her approach is linear in a sense, because she develops characters that then lead to dichotomies, that then transition into themes, that transmit meaning to the reader.

What other pairings and dichotomies can you think of?

Language: Dynamic and Mutable

As I read The Four Quartets again, I noticed that Eliot is very interested in language and how it changes with time. He references the dynamic nature of language in the following quote:

Words move, music moves

Only in time; but that which is only living

Can only die. Words after speech, reach

Into the silence. Only by the form, the pattern,

Can words or music reach

The stillness…

…Words strain,

Crack and sometimes break, under the burden,

Under the tension, slip, slide, perish,

Decay with imprecision, will not stay in place,

Will not stay still. Shrieking voices

Scolding, mocking, ore merely chattering,

Always assail them. (Buirnt Norton, V)

Eliot stresses in this passage that the meaning of language is not static, but constantly changes based on how people use it. Words “crack” and “break” because their meanings are assigned to them by a society that is constantly changing. As people use language, whether “shrieking,” “scolding,” or “chattering,” meanings change, and language cannot bear the “burden” of having objective meaning. However, the “words after speech,” which seem to refer to the unspoken words (for I’m not sure what else “words after speech” would be) are able to “reach into the stillness.” Their significance derives from their “form” and “pattern." These terms seem to be referring to the aesthetic characteristics of a text, what emerges when one studies a text in a vacuum – not against the backdrop of our world, but as one united text that only refers to itself. This view of a text allows it to break away from time and have objective meaning in a timeless world that consists only of itself.

Eliot describes the challenges he faces with spoken language, for he is

Trying to use words, and every attempt

Is a wholly new start, and a different kind of failure

…

For last year’s words belong to last year’s language

And next year’s words await another voice (Little Gidding, II).

Again, language changes and what signifies something at one point does not mean the same thing shortly thereafter. However, at the end of the work, it seems that Eliot alters his perspective on language. Instead of focusing on its mutability, he approaches it at the level of individual phrases and sentences. He asserts that “every phrase / And sentence that is right” is defined as one that is meaningful in relation to its direct context in the text. In such a sentence,

every word is at home,

Taking its place to support the others,

The words neither diffident not ostentatious,

And easy commerce of the old and the new,

The common word exact without vulgarity,

The formal word precise but not pedantic,

The complete consort dancing together (Little Gidding, V).

The words in this “right” sentence make sense in relation to the words around it. Such a sentence, Eliot concludes, is “an end and a beginning” because it transcends time. Its language becomes objectively meaningful to the reader, contributing to the creation of human history, which is a “pattern of timeless moments.”

The End and The Beginng

(Hi, sorry this is a little late-- late but not least!)

When I read T.S. Eliot’s “The Wasteland” and “The Four Quartets” for our class, I did so after walking through a city that was just emerging from the gray shadow of winter into the light of springtime. I found that the change in seasons (especially as the end of Daylight Savings Time and Passover approaches!) helped set the mood for me as I paged through Eliot’s depiction of an “unreal city”. However, when I read both poems, I was struck by the sweeping scope of the language used within them, as well as the questions that seemed to underlie Eliot’s elegant diction

In the last section of “The Wasteland”, titled “What the Thunder Said”, Eliot writes, “Who is the third who walks always beside you? When I count, there are only you and I together/But when I look ahead up the white road/There is always another one walking beside you” (Eliot lines 360-364). In this final section of Eliot’s tour through a broken, fallen world, he tries to identify an unknown, unseen presence always present throughout his journey, an allusion to Jesus. However, this question suggests that at the end of his exploration of humanity’s darkest moments, he is now aware that there is a path out of the morass, guided by an unseen presence. Eliot now knows that his path to a better, more enlightened road is via “the white road”, but still questions how to get there.

In a later stanza in “What The Thunder Said”, Eliot describes this path, by stating, “My friend, blood shaking my heart/The awful daring of a moment’s surrender/Which an age of prudence can never retract. By this, and this only, we have existed… We think of the key, each in his prison/Thinking of a key, each confirms a prison” (Eliot lines 402-405, 413). When Eliot talks about a “prison” he is referring to the dark, unenlightened world in which the human spirit is forced to be in, which he can only escape via achieving “the awful daring of a moment’s surrender”, by which he means the complete and total unity with G-d that one can only attain by submitting oneself to Him. “The Wasteland” concludes on this note, with Eliot sitting “upon the shore… with the arid plain behind me” (423-24). Clearly, Eliot now feels that he can put his lonely, dark existence in the mundane world behind him. Indeed, when he asks, “Shall I at least set my lands in order?”, he is actually asking himself whether he is ready to put his own inner turmoil to rest and completely submit himself to G-d in order to leave the cold, dead world behind.

This is why he begins “The Four Quartets” on a note of spiritual exaltation, reveling in complete unity with the Divine. In the first section of the poem, he exults, “Below, the boarhound and the boar/Pursue their pattern as before/But reconciled among the stars… Neither from nor towards; at the still point, there the dance is,/But neither arrest nor movement… Where past and future are gathered” (Eliot, lines 59-60, 61-64). Eliot describes the union of two mortal opposites, the boarhound and the boar, when they leave the bounds of temporal existence and enter into complete unity with the divinity within the cosmos.

Furthermore, Eliot’s emphasis on using words like “reconciled”, and “gathered” provide a sense that elements of reality are coming together and healing, which lends “The Four Quartets” a sense of continuation from “The Wasteland”. By doing so, this phrasing enables “Quartets” to pick up the broken pieces of spirituality from “Wasteland”, and bring them into a state of spiritual bliss, unencumbered by the concerns brought on by temporal existence.

Modernizing the Dramatic Monologue

T.S. Eliot’s The Waste Land is considered a modern day version of the dramatic monologue. In my first encounter with the text, I was surprised that it is even considered a dramatic monologue at all. According to my understanding of the more traditional, 19^th century Victorian version, a dramatic monologue is a poetic form which includes a speaker and auditor, but which also carves out a place for the reader. Robert Browning invented this form, and wrote poems like My Last Duchess, which include all the dramatic monologue’s elements; a speaker, auditor, and reader. The duke in My Last Duchess, for example, speaks to the envoy of his bride-to-be’s father after killing his previous duchess. This means that the envoy, or the speaker, is not directly communicating to the reader of the poem; instead, the auditor occupies an intervening position between speaker and reader. As readers of poems, we are used to being directly spoken to by characters. Yet Browning wanted to transform this convention of communication, and uses a silent auditor to accomplish this. But what made the dramatic monologue even more revolutionary was the way Browning disguised his own voice through the poem. Often readers associate characters of a poem with the actual poet, assuming the voice of the character to reflect the voice of the poet. By designing so many layers of characters between the poet and the reader, the voice of the poet is lost. Not only is there a speaker between the poet and reader, but an auditor is introduced as well, thus creating even more distance between poet and reader. Eliot, in The Waste Land, modernizes the dramatic monologue. While he may stick with some of its traditional elements, Eliot complicates its form, giving it new meaning. Glennis Byron, in his book Dramatic Monologue, writes,

There is no apparent auditor in this monologue, although it remains marked by the signs of communication; indeed, as in the case of Pound and Eliot, there are few actual auditors, at least ones who are living and present...

By practically eliminating the role of the auditor, Eliot completely changes one of the main functions of Browning’s dramatic monologues. Browning set out to sever the link between poet and reader through the auditor, yet Eliot seems to overlook this. Instead, he uses his own method to create poetic complications. Byron writes,

Rather than playing with the tension between the voice of poet and speaker, both Eliot and Pound can be said to create multiple fragmented voices which become a composite voice, a voice which is, ultimately, the voice of the poet.

Eliot disguises his own poetic voice through “fragmented voices”. The Waste Land consists of many different voices which can sometimes become quite confusing. We aren’t always sure who is speaking and where the speakers are located. Whereas Browning’s monologues usually offer clear indication of setting, speaker, and listener, Eliot’s model seems less clear. In doing so, Eliot designs new methods of complicating the role of the speaker. He presents a newfound take on the traditional dramatic monologue, allowing for a rebirth of the poetic form.

Puzzle Pieces: Searching for Intertextuality in Eliot

Ever wanted to learn more about the world? Learn about different cultures, languages, philosophies, and religions? This may be a gamble, but this blog post will assume the answer is yes. Here are two words to assist the reader on this educational journey: read Eliot.

Eliot draws upon many aspects of culture for his poetry. In his classic “The Waste Land”, Eliot uses four different languages before the poem even begins! But perhaps most notable is his use of intertextuality and connection. The first paragraph hints to Walt Whitman, with the use of the word “lilacs”, while the next line directs the reader back hundreds of year to Chaucer’s “Canterbury Tales”, and furthermore the next reference is for an area of Germany. The first ten lines transport the reader to different time periods and even geographic locations. The intrepid reader will research these other sources and try to figure out how they all fit together while simultaneously gaining an education in a variety of subjects.

Eliot is almost a puzzle. Every word in his poem is deliberate, and ever reference is carefully thought out. Though it may seem tricky to know where the references are in the text (especially in an unannotated version) that is part of the fun of Eliot. The Biblical references may be easier to catch, but the rest are worth struggling with.

Eliot, if truly studied, opens new academic worlds. Did the line “pearls that were his eyes” come up in Eliot? Yes? It’s from Shakespeare’s The Tempest. Never read The Tempest? Then go read The Tempest and truly study Eliot and the reference. (It’s really quite accessible, very much recommended.) One line in Eliot can prompt a whole five acts of Shakespeare. Indeed, not just The Tempest, but Hamlet too is referenced. A comprehensive Shakespeare education may be gained from “The Waste Land”.

Imagine how satisfying it can be to read a reference and instantly place the source. It’s like a metaphorical pat on the back for a job well-done or a quick confidence bolstering moment. Eliot is rife with such moments.

The multiplicity of languages Eliot are quite difficult to keep up with. Not to suggest learning 6 new languages just to read Eliot –that’s very difficult – but maybe look up the words or search the phrases. And while the Google search page is open, read more about the source of the quote (if it is indeed a quote), to acquire some context. Maybe the French comes from a story about the Holy Grail, or a name derives from Greek folklore – both occur in the poem – and having that background information enriches the understanding of the poem. Knowing original source material helps the poem come “alive” for the reader.

As quotations, references, and sources are stumbled upon in Eliot, it is necessary to ask how the work adds to Eliot’s writing, and what the reader can gain by knowing more about the other texts. The importance of knowing the original sources reaches farther than just Eliot, but all other works who quote Eliot’s sources too. Of course, by that time the reader will not need to locate the sources but can skip straight to the pat on the back.

Universal Insecurity

Dare I eat a peach? Dare I take a shot? Will he think I’m pretty? Will she think I’m hot?

T.S. Elliot’s “The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock” masterfully describes the anguished and meandering thoughts of a frustrated middle-aged man at a party. Although the description of the party, the setting, and the conversational context are all very much specific to the early twentieth century, Prufrock’s love song still retains a relevant universal appeal one hundred years later.

The alienation of man is one of the benchmarks of modernism, and Prufrock’s plight perfectly sums up all the fears and insecurities of an average man at a party. Prufrock, with all of his indecision, insecurity, fear, embarrassment, emasculation and sexual frustration has become a central figure of modernist alienation. “Do I dare?” Prufrock asks, again and again. Do I dare? He is indecisive and meek. “In the room the women come and go/ Talking of Michelangelo.” They talk of Michelangelo, but they do not talk of Prufrock. These women do not even know he exists, and if they do know he exists they will certainly only comment: “how his hair is growing thin!” or “how his arms and legs are thin!” Prufrock is self-defacing and pathetic, and yet the reader cannot help but identify with him.

Prufrock’s insecurities resonate with the reader because we have all, to some extent, occupied a similar position. Who can honestly say that they have never felt self-conscious in a social situation? Who can say that they have never felt out of place? Most importantly, is there any one who can, with total unbridled confidence, easily approach an attractive member of the opposite sex without feeling the least bit nervous? “The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock,” in all of its meandering randomness, perfectly captures the insecurities inherent to a modern social life. Our post-modern society has not eliminated these insecurities, in fact, in our quest for constant social connection, we have probably compounded upon these feelings of isolation. Imagine Prufrock today: Do I dare send her a friend request? Do I dare? Do I dare?

Prufrock’s sexual frustration and social anxiety evolve into broader anxiety surrounding art and life in general. This sets the stage for some of Elliot’s later works, most notably the Waste Land. Elliot’s frustration with art, poetry and the concept of articulation become apparent in the latter half of the poem. “It is impossible to say just what I mean!” Articulation of life, which the poet strives for, is impossible, at least according to Prufrock. It is interesting that Elliot chooses Prufrock, a non-poet, as the poems narrator. This suggests that these feelings of insignificance are not unique to artists, but rather to any educated modern man. By the end of the poem Prufrock, and Elliot, conclude that any fantastic vision of art will inevitably fall short. “Till human voices wake us, and we drown.” It seems that Prufrock serves two purposes. First, it is a reality check to the unbridled lyrical optimism of the Romantic period. Second, it is a call to action for modernists. Together, these two motives perfectly segue into Elliot’s masterpiece “The Wasteland.”

A Ruined Game of Chess

“A Game of Chess” represents a very important poetic experiment and experience, especially so for women. There are numerous subtleties throughout the latter half of “A Game of Chess” that not only contribute to the overall rhythm and tone of the work, but even more so, they act as an informative commentary on Eliot’s view of women.

In the beginning, Eliot portrays a high class, society woman. She is surrounded by exquisite things and is described as the picture of class.
“Doubled the flames of sevenbranched candelabra
Reflecting light upon the table as “
The glitter of her jewels rose to meet it,
From satin cases poured in rich profusion; 85
In vials of ivory and coloured glass”


Yet, she sits waiting for her lover, and as the poem contnues, she becomes more and more nervous, more frantic. Eliot portrays a woman with all the makings to be successful and powerful, yet she is totally dependent on another. Her thoughts become neurotic and almost nonsensical as she begs him to take interest in her,
“What shall I do now? What shall I do?'
'I shall rush out as I am, and walk the street
'With my hair down, so. What shall we do to-morrow?
'What shall we ever do?'”

Finally she makes plans to play a game of chess the following day, and with that she settles in, still nervous, but placated.

Next, Eliot introduces his readers to gaggle of lower class women, gathered in a barroom, chatting. With these women Eliot welcomed the end of the Victorian era, and with it, the puritanical views of the times. The women discuss a third friend, Lil, and her predicament with her husband. The woman recounts her conversation with Lil, and her chidings over Lil’s refusal to get false teeth and improve her appearance. Lil claimed that her ravaged appearance was the fault of medication she was taking.

“I can't help it, she said, pulling a long face,
It's them pills I took, to bring it off, she said.
(She's had five already, and nearly died of young George.) 160
The chemist said it would be alright, but I've never been the same.”

The women finally leave to a chorus of good nights.

Though the women from the first half and second half represent females from entirely opposite ends of the spectrum, they are strikingly similar. In the first, the unnamed woman remains helpless to the whims of her lover; she sits consumed and frantically begging him for attention, while he remains disinterested. In the second, Lil has done everything to be a good wife. She has remained loyal while he served in the army, she maintained a home by herself and she has given him five children. However, the cost of these contributions has been her appearance, and because of this she still remains in an unstable position in her marriage. Both women can do nothing but wait and hope that their respective mates will return and still want them.

The very rhythm of the poem portrays the nervousness, and the beaten feelings of the women. In the first half, as the poem continues, the line become choppier and more broken up, with the sense of things falling apart. In the second half, the dialogue is continuously interrupted with the bartender’s cries of “HURRY UP PLEASE IT’S TIME.” The reader feels rushed while reading their conversation, anxious for either the bartender to kick them up, or for their words to be cut short.

Eliot presents two separate types of women, one sterile and pitiful in her desperation, and the other sad and unheard in her complaints and sorrows. Both are damaged, and broken. Eliot is displaying a modern world in ruins, and these women are the wounded products of such a world. They are stuck in a game of chess, forced to remain only pieces for someone else’s game.

The Universality of Eliot

T.S. Eliot was a man of progression in terms of religion and his literary works. Slowly Eliot moves from the clarity and conciseness of “The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock” to the musicality and often covert thoughts of “The Four Quartets”. Eliot allows religion to seep into his writing which allows for his variability, seeing as his religious views were evolving. Yet, he never loses his focal point, the audience who may not be affiliated with religion or of a different faith. While “The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock” and “The Waste Land” are negative portrayals of the world and humanity; “The Four Quartets” takes a more positive approach to life and the possibility of redemption. Despite the discrepancies in theme, Eliot manages to create a unifying quality to all his works.

In “The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock” the main character is constantly questioning his every thought and action or lack thereof. Lines sixty-eight and eighty repeat the same question of “And how should I begin?” Alfred is clearly puzzled by the concept of initiation of a conversation and lacking social skills. Eliot asks a similar question in “The Waste Land” when he writes, “What shall I do now? What shall I do?” (line 131). This repetition of the query again shows the confused and searching qualities to his characters. A bridge between these two works is thus created, because of the reverberation of the sense of being lost and seeking a solution.

Although “The Waste Land” and “The Four Quartets” may seem like two unrelated poems there are overlapping themes. One of the most striking being the motif of water. Both “The Waste Land” and “The Four Quartets” use water as a symbol of rebirth and renewal. Water is viewed as a source of life and therefore, takes on the quality of redemption as well. The juxtaposition of the lines “April is the cruellest month” and “Midwinter spring is its own season” (line 1 The Burial of The Dead, line 1 Little Gidding) convey the same idea of a lack of rebirth when natural rejuvenation should occur. The line 'What! Are you here?' from Little Gidding part two reflects a similar question asked in “The Waste Land”. With regards to “The Waste Land” the question is phrased, “What is that noise?” and is also referenced in a later portion saying, “Who is the third who walks always beside you?” (line 117, line 360). All three questions are referring to G-d and the presence of G-d. These commonalities also create a bridge between Eliot's works and exemplify his tendency to reuse certain main principles that affect his life.

To summarize, Eliot's writings may appear to be disjointed on the surface, however through further analysis a common threads are revealed. His basic core beliefs appear in each of his works and are meant to remind the reader of their importance. Eliot does not limit his use of repetition solely to his separate works, rather he also uses juxtaposition and references throughout his individual works. One example is that of London in “The Waste Land”. In the beginning of the poem London is described as a city that is in pristine condition and bustling with people. By the end of the poem the nursery rhyme “London Bridge is Falling Down” is being quoted to show that London is in a state of shambles. While this may be the progression of London described in “The Waste Land”, “The Four Quartets” paints a completely different picture. Throughout that poem London is elevated and meant to be looked upon as an archetype of regeneration. This goes to show that while Eliot's works are a bridge to one another they are not mutually exclusive in their representation or interpretation.

Eliot’s Waste Land- An Internal or External Place?

As a modernist writer, T.S. Eliot employed a poetic collage of allusions and voices to represent the fragmentation of the place and time in which he lived and wrote. Many lines and references in his poem allude to the ruin of the European continent as a result of the trauma of World War I. While we might assume that the poet depicted conditions in society at that tumultuous time, we must also consider that Eliot’s particular psyche, with its own stresses and frustrations, was also significantly affected by those very conditions. He was not merely reflecting the external conditions, but he was experiencing an internal waste land as well, one in which he could no longer cope, ultimately leading to his nervous breakdown.

On a physical plain, the land was explicitly destroyed by the violence and death of war; the bombings, movement of troops, and trench warfare all rendered the land a waste. Plant life was killed and cities were ruined, and the waste and wreckage, The river sweats/ Oil and tar, were carried out to the sea. Many references are made to the dead and bones- Lilacs out of the dead land and …rats’ alley/ Where the dead men lost their bones. The great number of young men killed in the war, I had not thought death had undone so many, are now buried in this same waste land. That corpse you planted last year in your garden,/ Has it begun to sprout? Will it bloom this year? Has the soil been poisoned, rendered infertile, or will it revive again? April, a time traditionally associated with rebirth and resurrection, is unpromisingly called the cruellest month.

In a social sense, Eliot also portrayed a waste land, one of decadence and infertility in relationships. His characters are sexually dysfunctional or frustrated from meaningless, impersonal, and unproductive encounters between the sexes. A hermaphroditic bisexual, Tiresias…is... throbbing between two lives,/ Old man with wrinkled female breasts, symbolic of the impossibility of normal relations and reproduction. The change of Philomel, by the barbarous king/ So rudely forced alludes to the pain of a rape scene. The squalor and decay of debased marriage is evident in the pleading with Lil before Albert’s imminent return to make yourself a bit smart…To get yourself some teeth…For sure he wants a good time,/ And if you don’t give it him, there’s others will. Albert’s infidelity is matched only by Lil’s in her adulterous relations and abortions.

The montage of these various images and dialogues may be representative not only of the poet’s external world, but may implicitly refer to Eliot’s fragmented mind through which all his previous literary knowledge streamed. The fact that bombs were literally falling on London as fragments of this poem were being written must have taken its toll on his fragile sanity. In addition to this physical situation, Eliot also suffered sexual and emotional fears as a homosexual in a marriage with a wife who also had a nervous breakdown. The stress of their failure to have children, a natural expectation from a marriage, is perhaps reflected in the lines Murmur of maternal lamentation… And bats with baby faces as well as the query, What you get married for if you don’t want/ children?

Suffering from mental exhaustion, Eliot traveled to the beach where On Margate Sands./ I can connect/ Nothing with nothing. At the lowest point in his mental state when he went to Switzerland for treatment, Eliot wrote By the waters of Leman I sat down and wept. In his attempt to make those aforementioned connections in this most trying time in his life, the juxtaposition of traditional texts from the Bible and Buddhist stories to plays of Shakespeare and libretti of opera demonstrated a personal and cultural fragmentation through which he desired to make order out of his external and internal chaos. These fragments I have shored against my ruins… Shantih shantih shantih are a more positive reflection and expectation, ending in almost a prayer-like fashion. It signals the hope that he emerged from the torture of this waste land by way of the insight and spiritual redemption he experienced through “the peace which passeth understanding” in these texts.

Important Message from Professor Miller: Please Read

When you read this blog post, please post a simple comment in the thread below. Something like "read it" will suffice. I want to see how long it takes everyone to respond. Many of you are not responding to each other's posts, and I want to see how many people are taking the blog (and by implication the class) seriously. Also, a few of you aren't keeping up with your blog posts. Please, don't make me nag you about this, and please, don't make me reduce your grade. The blog is a key component of the class, and it requires everyone's participation. If you catch up with all of your blog posts by the end of this week--and if you stay caught up from here on out--then all will be forgiven.

Please confirm below that you have read this post.

- Water, Rain, Red, and Violet in The Waste Land

T. S. Eliot often uses a number of metaphors, images, and references within his writing that the reader must be both aware of and pay close attention to in order not to miss them. Furthermore, there are a number of themes and motifs that are repeated throughout; and if the text is not read closely they can easily be overlooked.

One of the major themes that Eliot seems to be obsessed with in his writing is Infertility. He incorporates the concept of infertility in many ways; including infertility in terms of lack of productivity, infertile land, and sexually infertile/non-reproductive beings. Even the title of one of his most important works is called The Waste Land, hinting to a land which is nothing but infertile and unable to produce.

One of the ways that Eliot discusses infertility is with the use of the image of water. Water is often used as a metaphor for life and fertility within The Wasteland, and the lack of water represents void of life and infertility. In line 22, Eliot writes “And the dry stone no sound of water.” Eliot talks about a world, possibly referring to the modern world he lived in, as dry and void of any water. Water here seems to represent life and fertility; instead there is nothing but a wasteland. The image of water comes up many more times throughout such as on lines: 55, 136, 182, 201, 257.

The word water comes up incessantly in the last section as well. In all instances, Eliot again talks about the dryness of the place and how “Here is no water(331),” “there is no water (357).” Instead there is “Rock and no water and the sandy road (332).” Eliot uses words like rocky and Sandy, symbolizing the inability to grow or plant new life, stressing the land’s infertility and lack of water/life.

Throughout the poem, Eliot also uses the image of rain to overlap and reinforce the image of water as well. In the last section Eliot describes the lack of water as “dry sterile thunder without rain (347).” This use of rain is balanced with the word ‘sterile,’ again emphasizing how sterile and infertile the land is. Furthermore, Eliot describes “the limp leaves” as having “waited for rain.” Whenever he mentions a word which suggests life like water or rain, Eliot uses it in reference to something limp or lacking this water/rain, suggesting this theme of infertility.

Another technique that Eliot often employs throughout his writing is the use and repetition of specific colors. In The Wasteland, Eliot uses the colors of red and violet quite often throughout the poem. The first instance of the color red is in line 24/25 of the poem, “… Only/there is shadow under this red rock,” This red description comes right after he mentions the rock of being void of water, using red to suggest a destructive and futile emotion. In the last section of the poem, Eliot again uses the color red amongst his detailed descriptions of the lack of water. Eliot writes, “red sullen faces sneer and snarl.” Here too Eliot uses the color red to represent a destructive emotion of aggression as the “faces snarl.”

In addition to the color red, Eliot often uses the color violet to describe what is going on in his poem. Violet seems to have somewhat of a decadent quality and is used twice to describe “the violet hour.” Eliot describes the violet hour as a time of waiting, “like a taxi throbbing waiting.” It is a throbbing sort of wait, a painful and slow anticipation. Later in the poem Eliot uses violet again to describe the “violet air” with “cracks and reforms” and “falling towers.” Again there is this unsettling quality that is reflected in the color violet.

It is apparent from Eliot’s usage of imagery and metaphor that when reading his text, or any text, it is necessary to look out for repetition of key images. In this way one can learn more about a specific word or image by the descriptions and allusions made from the other times it is mentioned in the text.

Stein as Magical Realism

As Borges wrote in Labyrinths, there are a people to whom life is “a heterogeneous series of independent acts”. Borges means that to a people he invented in his work, they cannot name something because to name something is to classify something, to say what something is and ascribe to it certain qualities. Borges’ inhabitants could not do this. Neither can Stein. 

Marquez’s masterpiece “A Hundred Years of Solitude” treats time in the same way. In Marquez’s world, there is no past, only present. Time spirals around one family, where they walk forward but look backward to their family past. Thus, the past is ever present and ever changing. So too for Stein.

This form of magical realism fits Stein. Stein’s writing does not describe the thing it is looking at, but how she is looking at it, her thought processes and what she sees[1]. Were she to describe the object or food or room she is beholding, she could not accurately describe it. As Borges said, to name something is to boil something down to its essence. Stein’s writing, despite its title, does not do this. She does not want to do this either.

Inspired by Picasso and other up and coming artists, Stein wished to give her reader a snapshot of her vision and thoughts, the way visual arts captured those moments with paint. To represent a single moment in time and only provide that moment’s vision, but through words, was Stein’s aspiration. Therefore is a carafe a “cousin”, a word chosen to represent what Stein saw and felt as she was looking at the carafe. Cousin, certainly, does not describe a carafe but it may encapsulate what Stein thought or felt, possibly because the words sound similar. 

Marquez’s idea of spiraling time fits Stein as well. Look at her buttons about chickens. The same object, the same title, yet told in a different way in four buttons. Those four different ways build off of each other, like stepping stones about chicken. She spirals around the chicken, which each button she advances the reader’s understanding of chicken as Stein sees it but yet looks backwards to build off of the preceding chicken. First, chicken is a “peculiar bird”, then she builds that up to a “dirty bird”, then to “mean” and finally the repetition of the word “stick” to describe the chicken. Spoken aloud, stick sounds violent and hate-filled. Chicken is not, to Stein, just peculiar, dirty, or mean, but something to be violent towards. Like Marquez’s created family, she turns an object around and around to assemble that object from different angles and ideas. 

The tricky thing is getting into this state of mind at the outset of Stein. She needs to be constantly read and struggled with in order to understand this writing. More time must be spent working through her words, words which are representative not of objects or themselves, but only a fleeting moment in time, a constantly evolving moment.

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[1] What she sees is different than what the object is, as is apparent in the first button: most people know what a carafe is and that it is not a “blind glass”. Thus she tells us she sees a “blind glass” but that does not describe the thing she is looking at, the carafe.

Interpreting Stein

In our class on Monday, February 28, the students expressed their frustration with Gertrude Stein’s writing style. Among the comments aired in class were “She’s hard to make sense of”, “You have to kind of go around her to understand her”, and “She’s a non-linear writer”. Indeed, everything about Gertrude Stein was different from the authors we had previously read. For example, since her writing in “Four Saints in Three Acts” didn’t follow a traditional plotline, the way we construed her words couldn’t follow the usual analytical conventions. Furthermore, her diction in this short story lends itself to seemingly endless repetition, repeating some words for entire section, with no indication for why such word is emphasized. After many attempts to make sense of these elements in her text, only one question remained: Why?

The first step we must take to resolving the conundrum presented by Stein’s writing is to let go of the traditional demands set by literary analysis, in which the typical scholar asks how the placement of a given set of words is significant to the rest of the passage, or why it’s important that a certain phrase is repeated throughout the body of the work. By doing so, we step back from trying to apply traditional analytical lenses to a very non-traditional body of writing, and start observing the text itself rather than pick it apart.

Observing the text, the second step, entails reading with an eye to the effect of the words on the paper itself, and how it sounds when you read it. As a reader of Gertrude Stein, it’s far more important for you to notice the effect created by combination of the words “All of them might be with them all of them at that time” (Stein 606), rather than wondering why Stein chose to repeat the words “all” and “them” so many times. Since these words seem to be used at random, it suggests that Stein intended for her writing to be resistant to interpretation, defying conventional methods of literary interpretation.

In addition, the random arrangement of the words in “Four Saints in Three Acts” echoes the random surge of words that accompany the stream of human thought. and expresses the ebb and flow of what goes on when a person is trying to reinvent the conventional ways of interpreting their world. This structural style indicates that perfection arises out of self-expression, because it gives each person the ability to build their own idea of the world based on how they process it with all of their senses. In addition, it suggests that perfection of the human mind arises out of the expression of human thought.

For example, in Act III, Scene VIII, Stein expresses her worldview by stating, “Ordinary pigeons and trees. If a generation all the same between forty and fifty as as. As they were and met. Was it tenderness and seem... Ordinary pigeons and trees. This is a setting which is as soon which is as soon which is as soon ordinary setting which is as soon which is as soon and noon” (Stein 608). When interpreted as the flow of a given person’s thought process, this passage becomes the complete cycle of perception. Moving from mundane thoughts about pigeons to enlightened musings about the “generation… between forty and fifty”, Stein’s words prove to be an expression of the human mind’s ability to use its tendency toward random thought as a method for making sense out of an equally random world.

Painting with Words

As I pondered about Stein’s repetitious and circular writing style that paints pictures instead of telling stories, I thought of another member of the Modernist movement, William Carlos Williams, and his poem “The Dance”:

In Brueghel's great picture, The Kermess,
the dancers go round, they go round and
around, the squeal and the blare and the
tweedle of bagpipes, a bugle and fiddles
tipping their bellies (round as the thick-
sided glasses whose wash they impound)
their hips and their bellies off balance
to turn them. Kicking and rolling
about the Fair Grounds, swinging their butts, those
shanks must be sound to bear up under such
rollicking measures, prance as they dance
in Brueghel's great picture, The Kermess.

In this poem, Williams attempts to depict the painting the Kermess and capture the movement and excitement of its dancing scene. He uses rhyming words, especially ones that rhyme with “round,” in order to create the sense of repetitive movement from dancing. Furthermore, the poem begins and ends with the identical words: “In Brueghel’s great picture, The Kermess.” Not only are the dancers in the poem going “round and around” in endless circles, but the poem is a circle in itself in which the reader makes a “round” by the end of the poem and ends up exactly where he or she had started. In his effort to depict the painting, Williams attempts to infuse animation into something dead, noise into something silent, and motion into something unmoving. However, while one may go “round and around” in trying to describe a painting, ultimately, words cannot infuse it with the life that is present in its visual form, and the reader can only truly grasp its title and and name of painter.

While Williams tries to depict with words something that is understood through the senses, Stein does not try to accurately match her words to reality. For instance, in Tender Buttons, she does not even try to describe the objects that she lists as entry titles. Instead, she transcends the goal of realistic depiction. Instead of viewing language as a barrier to communication, like Williams, she views it as an endless door to opportunities. She does not try to limit herself to the meanings of language assigned by her social context; instead, she uses language freely, not trying to imitate something sensual by using words. Therefore, on the one hand, her words in each entry seem less connected to the object that she associates them with. On the other hand, they are much closer to the object because they are Stein’s subjective way of communicating about it. Just like Williams, she also uses repetition and rhyme--but not necessarily because they correspond with the object that she is writing about. She is the artist who is creating her own dancing scene based on her own imagination, instead of trying to imitate one from another painting like Williams. It is possible to say that Williams in this poem is trying to do realist painting, while Stein is involved in something more abstract.

Here is the image that Williams attempts to describe: