Disillusionment in “The Wasteland” by T.S. Eliot

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Disillusionment in “The Wasteland” by T.S. Eliot
“The Wasteland” is T.S. Eliot’s most controversial landmark with historical, literary, social, and moral significance. He wrote this poem to sketch the post-war, modern Europe, when man tended to become materialistic, unintentionally traveling to moral decay. After great bloodshed combined with moral instability, the traumatized minds met communism, which badly failed to solve people’s social, psychological, and spiritual dilemmas. Eliot supports his views and disillusionment through rich imagery and symbolism and suggests emotional and spiritual remedies to break the spell of despair and the aftermaths of war. “The Wasteland” is a social critique of the hollowness of the modern man, signified by the poet by digging old graves and showing the same disillusionment with the modernism in need of spiritual remedies through imagery and symbolism.
Eliot draws mental sickness and neuroticism of post-war, modern society by referring to the access of homosexual and heterosexual tendencies among all social divisions. He takes examples and speculations from different classes and cultures to indicate the equally dominated psyche of modern people by eroticism. The poetess portrays German princes as a symbolic representation of the European aristocratic class in the twentieth century. Likewise, He exhibits the prevailing neuroticism in the upper class through Lady of Situation with her glamourous lifestyle. Both ladies depict the dangerously excessive tendency to desire. They are erotic, extremely sentimental, and victims of anxiety and mental health issues. Eliot encompasses both male and female gender while discharging his pessimism about the immoral tendencies of the post-war era (Sharma 132). Like women representatives, He also draws male representatives to unveil the psychological breakdown of the young European generation. “the nymphs are departed” at river Thames twice in one stanza, which shows the moral inadequacies of city executives and merchants, spending time in the fun with unknown girls like Mr. Eugnides (Eliot). Also, the description of fun on the river Thames refers to the penetrating trend of homosexuality in society. Wasteland shifts from the male and female of the upper strata to the middle class to show a moral dilemma by depicting Madame Sososistris as “the wisest woman” (Eliot). Then, the poem unfolds the lower class with their minds dominated by desire. For example, the people are ready for all types of pleasure and excitement, whether it is homosexual, heterosexual, or mechanical, such as the typist girl and the daughter of the river Thames exploited by countless people (Eliot). The sound of “jug, jug, jug” at the end of the third section of the poem also specifies the incident of physical exploitation (Chan 4). In a nutshell, Eliot sketches the disillusionment through the surplus of desire in all social divisions of post-war Europe to highlight the psychological illness of the modern generation.
Eliot attempts to paint the gloomy atmosphere after World War I, and the poor administrative policies failed to solve the problems of saving people after a...