The Waste Land: A Facsimile & Transcript of the Original Drafts, Including the Annotations of Ezra Pound

The Waste Land is unarguably one of the Western world’s most important poems from the 20th century, and I’ve always loved it - baffling symbolism and strange prose included - even though I can’t claim to truly understand it. I mean, who can say that they do, in all honesty? Eliot was a weird dude by all measures, and sometimes you just have to let the joy of the weird person encompass you without getting caught up in it. In theory, the transcript publication of the original manuscript of the Waste Land (long held in the collection of John Quinn, Eliot’s friend and legal advisor) should shed some light on the poem itself, as readers are able to see edits made by Eliot and notes by Ezra Pound on the poems and fragments that became show more the finished Waste Land poem, but in a sense these drafts seem so far removed from the finished Waste Land that they can almost be considered separate entities themselves. In some cases this is more blatant than others, as Eliot’s second wife (and editor of the book) Valerie notes that certain poems remained unpublished and make no obvious further reference to their influence on the final Waste Land. Regardless of the transcript manuscript’s random contents (and my ongoing lack of interest in any attempt to formally analyse poetic content) the collection was a very interesting read, and I felt like my brain got a good workout in dealing with comprehending the dichotomy of understandable words combined into incomprehensible and strange ways. show less

Clearly the way to read The Waste Land: this includes the first published version, the preceding (often unpublished) poems that ended up being incorporated into The Wasteland, and the heavily edited and annotated text of an early draft of the poem.

The process of crafting the poem is made clear, and that is both eye-opening and unfortunate. It becomes apparent that the original version of the poem was highly personal, expressing Eliot's disillusion and despair after living in London. Many of the references are extremely private, in the sense that they will only be understood by a close circle of friends, and there is no sign that this could turn into a work of general appeal.

The hand of Ezra Pound changes all that, redacting much of the show more poem in order to make it more obscure but also to give it a more general appeal. Apparently it worked, but it does lend an air of chicanery to the whole deal - trading honesty and clarity for omission and obfuscation.

So if you want to understand The Waste Land and what it is about, forget all the essays that get packed into the Norton Critical and read this instead. You may find, though, that is lessens your appreciation of both Eliot and the poem. show less

I gotta say this is pretty much essential for fans of The Waste Land. It sheds light on the composition process, parts of the poem that are obscure, and Eliot's own life up to and after the poem's publication. Pound's, Eliot's, and Vivienne Eliot's marginalia are a pleasure to read. In fact, the book fully justifies Eliot's dedication for Pound as "il miglior fabbro." Through his intervention the poem transformed from a very good piece into what many call the greatest poem of the 20th century. I will definitely come back to this book in the future and delve further into what was going on.