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Thomas stern Eliot (1888 – 1965), a modernist playwright, a real critic, an eminent essayist and a recognized and reputed poet, is considered the leading literary figure of 20th century.
Out of his highly appreciated masterpieces, The Wasteland (1922) is considered the most successful, most complex and most obscure poem that is translated in many languages.
This poem sounds over intellectual because of the excessive use of allusions as he has used more than hundred allusions referring to more than 30 writers.
With completely disjointed incidents presented with mastered cinematic approach, this highly structured epic poem was published just after about three years of the end of World War I and depicts the prevailing hollowness of human morality and spirituality.�

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Eliot was inspired by James George Frazer’s The Golden Bough (1890) that, although a comparative study of religions, discussed moral and spiritual hollowness of society.
The other book that was the source for The Wasteland was Jessie L. Weston’s From Ritual to Romance (1919).
Both of these books talk about the legend of Fisher King and how his spiritual barrenness transformed his kingdom also into wasteland.
This king of Augustan age became infertile due to some injury and used to do fishing only nearby his palace. Then there came the knight Perceval in the quest of Holy Grail that was the cup or bowl in which Jesus Christ’s blood was kept after crucifixion and that had the power of fast recovery.
So Eliot has mentioned both of these moral and religious aspects in this poem and has also taken the title “The Wasteland” from this legend.�

The poem starts with an epigraph written in Greek and Latin that is taken from Satyricon written by Petronius in first century AC.
This strikingly outrageous and marvelous satire parodies the imperial Rome. Chapter 48 of this masterpiece discusses the Greek myth of Sibyl that is an old prophetess.
This mythological character was granted immortality by Apollo but forgot to ask for eternal youth. Hence her body withered away till only her voice was left and she was literally kept in a jar.
Eliot compares modern man with this old foreseer and says that the modern men are living in the modern wasteland with the fear of life and are haunted by the wish to die.

The very first part of the poem is about the Egyptian ritual in which they believe in the death for the purpose of rebirth or having a new start.
For some critics it is a representation of Christian ritual of the funeral of dead.
First part starts with the reference to Chaucer’s Prologue to the Canterbury Tales.
The prologue starts with the line “April is the cruelest month” and Eliot has also started this poem with the same line in a contradictory meaning.
He uses this reference to portray the dejection and depression of the age as in a destructed and barren surrounding this messenger of spring brings more gloom and despair.

Moreover Eliot uses verses from Richard Wagner’s opera “Tristan and Isolde” to moan over the destructive and sorrowful condition of the city of London.
Another very important allusion is from Aldus Huxley’s novel “Crome Yellow” that is of the fortune teller named Madame Sosostris.
Eliot’s Madame Sosostris tells the fortune of the modern man and foresees him dying by water.
This old wise lady reads tarot cards to tell the fortune of the man about drowning in water.
Eliot uses Shakespeare’s line of The Tempest “those are pearls that were his eyes” for the drowned dead man.

The next highlighted reference is the allusion of Baudelaire’s poem “The Seven Old Men” where he has used the phrase “Unreal City” for Paris.
In this allusion he compares London with Baudelaire’s Paris in terms of the moral and social condition.
For the same purpose Eliot has used the reference of Dante’s “Inferno”, a religious allegory, also and describes “London Bridge” as Dante’s “Gate of Hell”.

The title of second part of the poem is from Middleton’s The Game of Chess and the main plot for this part of poem is taken from “Women Beware Women” of the same writer.
Its main plot is about the seduction of a young wife by a gallant whose mother in law is enjoying the game of chess.
To explain the chair she sat in, Eliot uses the reference from Shakespeare’s Antony and Cleopatra and elaborates its grandeur marvelously.
He also uses the reference of Queen Dido of Carthage’s ceiling at this point to explain the setting that is taken from Virgil’s Aeneid.�

Eliot refers to Milton’s Paradise Lost book IV and explains the entry of gallant in the setting as Milton explains the entry of Satan in the garden of Eden in “Sylvan Scene”.
In the very next verse he symbolizes the expected tragedy of the wife with the tragedy of Philomela seduced by her brother in law King Trent in Ovid’s Metamorphosis.
At the end of this part he refers to Shakespeare’s line from Hamlet where dying Ophelia bids farewell by saying “good night, sweet ladies, good night, good night”.
He again uses Shakespeare’s line of The Tempest “those are pearls that were his eyes” for the seduced wife.

The title of The Fire Sermon is taken from Lord Buddha’s Fire Sermon that describes the burning humanity in the fire of hate and lust.
This is the most lengthy and complex section of this poem that depicts Eliot’s usage of cinematic technique very well.
Eliot takes the modern man beside river Thames pondering upon the condition of society.
He takes the phrase “Sweet Thames” from Edmund Spenser’s Prothalamion and highlights the pollution in it to symbolize the degeneration of modern civilization.