The Modernity of T.S.Eliot's The Waste Land from the Perspective of Image

Abstract

T.S. Eliot is an excellent symbolist poet whose poems are regarded as epoch-making landmark works in the history of modern Western literature. The long lyric poem "The Waste Land" is Eliot's representative work. It has a variety of styles, draws from a wide variety of sources, and combines some characteristics of symbolism, imagism, and metaphysics. The poet has created many rich images of "Waste Land", most of which are difficult to understand and have complex and profound symbolic meanings. Thus, the poetry reflects the absurdity of reality, reflects on the plight of human civilization, and pursues the road to the redemption of the "Waste Land". This paper first reviews the existing research results on Eliot in the world, briefly describes the theoretical basis of the project, and classifies the image in The Waste Land. Then, the typical artistic techniques in the process of image use are analyzed in detail. After all these, by researching the typical images, the article not merely reveals their symbolic meaning but explores the reflection and criticism of modernity in poetry. Finally, the article traces the source of the modernity criticism presented by the images from social and religious perspectives. The research results are summarized and evaluated in the last section of the article.