Gods, Shakespeare, and Hell: The Wasteland, sections Three and Four

Sections three and four of The Wasteland, titled The Fire Sermon and Death By Water, possess many allusions that, although obvious, are only distinguishable once you read the poem for the second or third time. The titles of both of these sections, for example, are references to well-known places or people. The Fire Sermon makes reference to Jonathan Edwards, the famous revival preacher of the First Great Awakening. Edwards always preached sermons that talked about human condemnation in a wrathful, burning hell. The Fire Sermon, therefore, makes an allusion to Edwards’ speeches about “sinners in the hands of an angry God”, burning and withering in hell.

Line 175 of the poem makes an allusion to A Midsummer Night’s Dream. The words “The nymphs are departed” make me remember Titania, who used to own many fairy servants she dispatched every time she talked to Oberon. T. S. Eliot, therefore, makes an allusion to Shakespeare, the famous English playwright.

Besides making allusions to English-speaking characters, Eliot also made allusions to Greek mythology. “I who have sat by Thebes below the wall lovers” (line 244) reminds me of the myth of Pyramus and Thisbe, in which these two lovers were separated by a wall. I wonder why Eliot would choose to talk about a tale of two lovers in a poem such as The Waste Land, a text with a very pessimistic mood. If Eliot is trying to preach the purposelessness of life, why does he make an allusion to two characters who actually have the motivation in life to find love?

On the following line, Eliot talks about hell once again. The verse “And walked among the lowest of the dead.” (line 245) makes an allusion to Dante, the voyager, in his work Inferno. Here, Dante and Virgil, another Roman poet, make a voyage through each of the nine circles of hell, walking “among the lowest of the dead”. This allusion is probably one of the clearest references to a well-known person in the text, as it focuses on the mayor theme of a work of literature and not on the small details, such as those mentioned previously when I talked about the allusion to A Midsummer Night’s Dream.

The words “O Lord Thou pluckest me out”, in lines 309 and 310, make a very clear allusion to the Judeo-Christian Bible, especially because of the use of old-English present in this verse and throughout the KJB. This line reminds me of the Old Testament, where characters used to appeal directly to God and talk to him as if he was a normal person.

Finally, the title of the fourth section, Death By Water, is also an allusion to a well-known individual. It reminds me of the Greek gods and Titans of the waters, Poseidon, Ocean, Pontus, Nereus, Triton, and Proteus. The Greeks used to believe that natural disasters were attributed to the gods, who dominated a specific area of the universe. The death of Phlebeas, the Phoenician sailor in this fourth section, makes an allusion to these Greek figures, masters of the seas.