References of Dante in T.S. Eliot's The Waste Land

Page 1 of 10

Ian Cleary5/1/15Professor Sherry BoothTake-Home Midterm

Assignment: Take something you have found in the poem—a speaker, an allusion, an image, a line or two (and there are other choiceshere)—that seems to provide an opening for a discussion of some important aspect of the poem.

Dante Alighieri’s The Divine Comedy is intrumental in further

imagining T.S Elliot’s The Waste Land. Foremost, the opening of

Elliot’s poem intertwines with the beginning of Dante’s The Divine

Comedy, more specifically his entrance from the wood in to The

Inferno. Secondly, Elliot’s Burial of the Dead alludes to Dante’s

experiences in The Inferno. Elliot describes London as The Unreal City

which is synonymous with what Dante calls the City Dolent. In Fire

Sermon, Elliot references a scene from Dante’s Purgatory

providing essential context in to understanding the Bradford

Millionaire and the horribal rape scene that follows. There is a

third Dante reference in What the Thunder Said, although focusing on

these first two will give the reader the full breadth of how

Elliot uses Dante’s narrative to convey his own. Several of the

most basic-however fragmented- concepts of The Waste Land are

theoretically derived from The Divine Comedy. One cannot define The

Page 2 of 10

Waste Land as a linear narrative, the core ideas should be

understood in isolation, though strung together they most

certainly project a vivid picture.

The beggining section of The Wasteland begins similar to

The Divine Comedy. “What are the roots that clutch, what branches

grow…And the dead tree gives no shelter, the ricket no relief…

Come in under the shadow of this red rock (Elliot, pg 5, 19-25).”

Meanwhile Dante describes an equally eary scene when he enters a

wooded area which later leads him in to the gates of hell: “I

found myself within a forest dark…What was this forest savage,

rough, and stern…So bitter is it, death is little more (Dante, pg

1).” Both poems begin in a obsurce forest region, surrounded by

thick wooded areas and rough terrain. The imagery projects

imagery of the forest at night, which conventionally speaking is

considered dangerous. Thus the two stories begin within similar

structures.

The first Dante reference within The Waste Land is in The Burial

of the Dead: “Unreal City / Under the brown fog of a winter dawn /

A crowd flowed over London Bridge, so many / I had not thought

death had undone so many / Sighs, short and infrequent, were

Page 3 of 10

exhaled (Elliot, pg 7, 60-65).” In What the Thunder Said Elliot

references a childrens nursery rhyme: “London Bridge is falling

down falling down (Elliot, pg, 19, 426).” Elliot uses these

specific images to describe London, it is clear that it is London

because he mentions it’s famous bridge twice. He imagines a city

that is dormant, morbid and deathly.

When Dante enters hell upon the gates inscribed are the

words as follows: “Through me the way is to the City dolent /

Through me the way is to eternal dole (Dante, pg 11).” Dante goes

on to describe hell: “Of people, that I ne’er would have believed

/ That ever Death so many had undone / When some among them I had

recognised (Dante, pg 13).” Dante describes The Inferno as a city,

this coincides with Elliots reference of The Unreal City.

Furthermore, he mentions that many of the members of hell he

recognizes from life. In Canto IV of The Divine Comedy, Dante also

remarks on the number of highly distinguished people whom were

doomed to eternity in The Inferno. Socrates and Plato are among

those who are condemned: “There opposite, upon the green enamel /

Were pointed out to me the mighty spirits…There I beheld both

Socrates and Plato (Dante, pg 20, Canto IV).” Thus Dante equally

Page 4 of 10

projects The Inferno in a light where many well known people in

life are destined for the City Dolent, granted they are doomed

because they are pagan, which does not coincide with Elliot’s

depiction, although the overall sense of dissillusionment is

frequently shown in both texts.

It is clear that Elliot’s Unreal City is synonymous with

Dante’s City Dolent, but why? It is probable Elliot imagined life

on earth as a consuming Inferno, and thus uses the imagery of

Dante’s poem so. Line 64 from The Waste Land is also from Dante:

“Sighs short, and infrequent, were exhaled (Elliot, pg 7, 64).”

In Dante’s text this scene describes the people among the inferno

whom are restless and exceedingly ill. This second line from

Dante in the first section further sets the scene of Elliots poem

in the realm of Dante’s Inferno. Furthermore, when Dante walks

among the dead in The Inferno, he is eccedingly aware that he is not

among the living. Although for Elliot there is ambiguity as to

wether the people of London are dead or living. It can be said

that they are concious of death, or partially dead due to the

horrible events of the time period. Elliot leaves his readers to

speculate wether those he imagines in The Unreal City to be among the

Page 5 of 10

living or dead. Elliot may also be trying to convey that life

itself is like The Inferno. Although Dante’s christian concept of

hell denounced all pagans, this is not relevant for Elliot,

although it is clear that Elliot feels a sense of doom among the

people of the living, and Dante’s imagery within The Inferno

therefore is most prevalent. The overwhelming sense of

dillusionment is graphically shown through the literary ingenuity

of T.S Elliot.

The second Dante reference is in Elliot’s third section

formidabley known as The Fire Sermon. Elliot-from the perspective of

Tiresius (both male and female)- tells a horrifying tale of a woman

that is sexually assualted by a man known as the Bradford

Millionaire: “As a silk hat on a Bradford Millionaire, The time is

now propitious…The meal is ended, she is bored and tired…Flushed

and decided, he assualts at once…(Elliot, pg 13, 234-239).” From

Elliot’s notes one can derive her name as The Rhine Maiden.

Following the assault the woman remarks: “Highbury bore me.

Richmond and Kew / Undid me (Elliot, pg 15, 293-95).” She states

she was born in Highbury and the assault occured in another

district across town known as Richmond and Kew. Though the

Page 6 of 10

important aspect of the lines which is relative to Dante is the

phrasing: Richmond and Kew / Undid me. In The Divine Comedy, when Dante

is in purgatory, he is approached by spirit by the name The Pia

or La Pia. “Do thou remember me who am the Pia; Siena made me,

unmade me Maremma; He knoweth it (Dante, pg 197).” It is here

the reader learns this woman was murdered by her husband Maremma.

The reader can also note the similar structure and poetic form of

both texts, while also realizing the similarity of content of

each event within its respected text.

While Elliot wrote of a The Rhine Maiden being assualted by

the Bradford Millionaire with the silk hat, Dante recollects his

experience in purgatory where La Pia tells him of her horrific

murder by her own husband Maremma. Both the former and latter

allude to tyrannical men oppressing their female counterparts. It

is clear part of Elliot’s dissilussionment in The Waste Land has to

do with an imbalance among the sexes. He also alludes to possible

harmony among sexes as a solution to the dissillusionment he

feels. The reference to Dante’s profound experience with the

spirit of La Pia also suggests patriarchal dominance. Therefore

not only does Elliot use phrasing similar to Dante’s The Divine

Page 7 of 10

Comedy, but he also graphically describes The Rhine Maiden in a

similar state of oppression as La Pia.

In both texts men are dominating women, yet this is also

reflective of nations dominating other nations. Thus connections

with these references are both personal and political. During

Elliot’s lifetime World War 1 was bringing to light the many

atrocities of a male dominant society, as well as the nature of

the nationalistic society. World War 1 consisted of nations

competing for complete domination of Europe. Thus the Bradford

Millionaire & Maremma are representative of the patriarchal

dominance within society during Elliot’s time period, They also

symoblize the waring nations in World War 1. La Pia and The Rhine

Maiden are distinguished as the oppressed female sex, as well as

the nations whom are being destroyed by the war. The female

figures also symbolize the fallen soldiers who died in vein, and

the cultures of self destructing nations. National pride can be a

great thing, though in the context of World War 1 pride is more

known to be brutish, apish chest pumping. The destructive forces

of patriarchal / national dominance has to this day detrimental

consequences to life and culture. War and violence is the death

Page 8 of 10

of culture, which is why both Elliot and Dante highlighted the

murdering and raping male as bringing discord to society. One

cannot overlook the staggering notion that Dante’s remarks on

female opression over five hundered years ago are still relavent

today. This shows the character flaws of oppressive societies and

how it has been this way throughout the centuries.

T.S Elliot uses Dante’s The Divine Comedy to help construct the

sublime nature of The Waste Land. Not only do both works have

structural similarities but they also convey incredibley powerful

images and statements that cannot be overlooked. Dante’s text

warns its readers of the defected nature of society, and Elliot

responds conveying a similar emotional state of helplessness. It

is clear Elliot’s poem stands on its own as one of the most

notable works of the modern period. The Waste Land does not

replicate Dante’s The Divine Comedy but rather builds on it. Dante

cannot comprehend the present, for he is rooted in the past.

Though Elliot ressurects these important ideas and uses them to

convey a feeling of dissilusionment in the present, in doing so

he brings Dante to life as never before.

Page 9 of 10

Works Cited

Longfellow, Henry Wadsworth, and Dante Alighieri. The Divine Comedy.

Champaign: Acheron, 1997. Print.

Page 10 of 10

Elliot, T.S. The Waste Land. Ed. Michael North. London: W.W Norton,

2001. Print.