T. S. Eliot's Poetic Devices

T.S. Eliot's Poetical Devices

T.S. Eliot was one of the great early 20th Century poets. He wrote many poems throughout his career including "The Waste Land"(1922), "The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock"(1917), and "Ash Wednesday"(1930). Throughout his poems, he uses the same poetic devices to express emotion and give an added depth to his poetry and act like a trademark in his works. One of the devices used throughout is his personification of nature. The second device he often uses is allusions to Greek mythology, Greek plays, and the Christian bible. Finally, the last device he often uses is imagery of death. Throughout the poems mentioned above this is especially apparent as it makes them all seem identifiable to his style.

T. S. Eliot often personifies nature in his poetry to intensify its importance in his poetry. The first example comes from the poem "The Waste Land" where it says "The jungle crouched, humped in silence" Since a jungle cannot crouch it shows how Eliot uses personification in nature because he is using it to describe the jungle to give the feeling he is trying to evoke in his reader. An example from "The Love Song Of J. Alfred Prufrock" of how Eliot personifies nature throughout his work is "The yellow fog that rubs its back upon the window-panes." This is personification because fog has no back and therefore cannot rub it against a windowpane. In this case, he is using the yellow fog to show how the world he is describing is dirty and sullen because fog is not normally yellow. By giving nature a more human quality, it makes the world he describes feel life like. The last example of Eliot personifying nature comes from the poem "Ash Wednesday" where it reads "Yew trees pray for those who offend her." Since praying is a human quality he is using it to personify nature to make it seem like it is religious. So overall, it is clear that Eliot uses personification in his poetry as shown through the examples above.

Not only is personification repeated in his poetry but also so is the imagery of death, which gives his poems a sad or dark tone. In his poem "The Waste Land", it reads "A current under sea picked his bones in whispers. As he rose and fell He passes the stages of his age and youth." Since the character is essentially trapped in time the image of bones gives it a dark feeling. The bones that are described are part of death because when a body decays, all that is left is bones and so he is trapped in time while dying. The second example of death in Eliot's poems comes from "The Love Song Of J. Alfred Prufrock" where it says, "I know the voices dying with a dying fall." This quote demonstrates death because the character knows people are dying. This shows that death is apparent in this poem because the author uses it to describe the world the character lives in. The final example of death in Eliot's poems comes from "Ash Wednesday" where it reads "The empty forms between Ivory Gates." The Ivory gates are associated with heaven and when someone dies, they will go to the gates in order to be judged by St. Peter. Death is apparent because the imagery of the Ivory Gates deals with the afterlife and what happens to the soul when someone dies. Overall, Eliot uses imagery of death throughout his work as shown through the examples given making this one of his 'trademark' poetic devices in his work.

The next poetic device that Eliot uses throughout his work is the allusions to mythology, religion, and other literature. The first example comes from the poem "The