Essay number 2 ...in

English lit essays seem to be a bit like those proverbial buses that you hear about.  You can wait years without seeing one then two come along at the same time.  This time it was a 'short' essay on Modernism and earlier today I submitted my 1,800 words on The Waste Land by T S Eliot.

Ever since I was introduced to Eliot's poetry I've found myself struggling with a bit of a conundrum.  Can you separate the writer from the work?  And if not, what then (if anything) might that tell you about yourself?

T S Eliot may be the greatest poet that ever put pen to paper.  Some of his poems are among the greatest ever written.  Think of Preludes, The Love Song of J Alfred Prufrock, The 

Journey of the Magi, The Hollow Men, Four Quartets.  The list goes on.

Then, of course, there is The Waste Land  I think it truly is the greatest poem ever written in English; one of the most important texts of the 20th Century.  It is an endlessly fascinating, endlessly instructive piece of writing with a depth, complexity and subtlety that sometimes takes your novice breath away.

But what to do about the man?  A deeply conservative, somewhat misogynist, certainly anti-Semitic, high Anglican, Tory.  Those are not unfair accusations but statements of demonstrable fact.

So what does that mean for a trendy old Leftie like me?  I have no idea.

Read the poems,  Judge for yourself.

This much, however, I do know.  My essays are in.

On with the next lot of readings.