The phrasing of this specific line is one that emulates that of a last will or testament. The act of "setting one's lands in order" implies preparing them for a posthumous re-delegation or distribution. This further contributes to a reading (noted by several of my peers) of the above lines that literally describes Tiresias as the Fisher king and the failed Grail quest that is suggested by his continued "fishing".

The scene of the polluted river which "sweats oil and tar" is further dramatized through citation of Dante, which verifies to an extent that the scene of the person with "raised knees supine on the floor of a narrow canoe" is one of assault. The quote he references from Purgatorio 5:133-134 reads, "Do Thou remember me who am the Pia; Siena made me, unmade me Maremma” Pia de Tolemei was the gentle wife of a Tuscan captain, who threw her from a castle window in order to marry another woman. Siena refers to her noble family in which she was born, Maremma refers to the landholding of her Lord husband, assigning geographical locations to her "undoing". Therefore, the woman in the stanzas of TWL, is being "undone", being raped in Richmond, and murdered in Kew, the perpetrator weeping and promising "a new start", rendering the scene parallel to that of the white and black pawn from A Game of Chess, the man believing it necessary to "undo" what he has done by killing his victim, as well as the story of Pia. Finally, the identity of this woman I believe to perhaps be one of the nymphs "departed" from The Fire Sermon, the lyric and meter of the poem resembling a broken, distorted song, "Weialalala/Leia" and "la la". The industrial scene depicting the setting of the poem is further dramatized through this literal rape of nature.

Something I find very interesting is the varying descriptions both positional and physical coming from Tiresias. The aspects of inconsistency that riddle this stanza are paradoxical, as Tiresias is a figure we know to be blind, and posses foresight. The contradictions in position can be explained in part by the melding of his various oracles, when he "looks ahead up the white road" he sees another person walking beside us, but he also inquires "who is on that other side of you?" in the present tense, implying perhaps that this third party is ever present. The issue of prophethood though is called into question as the narrator struggles to define whether this figure it a "man or woman", suggesting perhaps that it is neither. Such a reading plays directly into the Hesse/Dostoevsky source wherein God/Providence is believed to be the third party located "between" the two brothers in conversation, suggesting that Tiresias, despite his prophecy, lacks the dictum to define God. This reading is seemingly contradicted however by the Visuhddi-Magga source in which the third party described is "repulsively human".

Naima brings up in her annotation surrounding the religious implications of this passage, that this passage depicts a purgatory of sorts wherein "we who were living are now dying" in a barren land of "rock without water" populated by "red sullen faces" that sneer and snarl "from the doors of mud-cracked houses". Coupled with the Psalm 63, "my soul thirsteth for thee, my flesh longeth for thee in a dry and thirsty land, where no water is;" and a portion of John which states, "He that loveth his life shall lose it; and he that hateth his life in this world shall keep it unto life eternal.", a greater quasi-biblical narrative is displayed in this passage, specifically one of punishment. I interpret the absence of water, and consequently God/the ability to achieve purification via baptism to be an intentional action as opposed to a conditional one, thus suggesting a complete withdrawal of the divine from the Wasteland in which those suspended in this dry land feel the "reverberation of thunder of spring over distant mountains", proving that the influence of the sublime exists "over distant mountains", but not for those who are "now dying" in purgatory. The excerpt from John, which I referenced earlier states, "He that loveth his life shall lose it; and he that hateth his life in this world shall keep it unto life eternal." This quote's syntax is very similar to the lines, "He who was living is now dead/We who were living are now dying" from TWL, the allusion implying a valoral distinction between the deceased "he who was living", corresponding to "he that loveth his life" and the slow dissolution and dehydration of "we who were living are are now dying" and the corresponding "he that hateth his life."

Between the draft and the published section, one of the major transformations which occur are enacted upon the role and greater prowess of the sea. In the draft, the "crew moaned; the sea with many voices moaned all about us.", such a line indicating a call and response of sorts between the members of his crew (which are notably stripped from the final draft) and the sea itself. This conversational exchange is repeated again at the begin of the poem, where Phlebas recalls his "his trade with wind and sea", suggesting once again a quasi-symbiotic relationship between the two parties. However, in the final draft, this conversational nature is completely removed, it's only remnants "the profit and loss" which came with "the deep sea swell", stripping the aspects of consent from this interaction, thus painting Phlebas as a conquerer and quasi-rapist of the sea as opposed to the more noble likes of Ulysses and his crew from which the draft references. The likes of whom viewed the sea as a means of exploration and well of knowledge. In Death By Water, the sea is reduced to that of a scavenger who "picked his bones in whispers", a stark contrast to the draft from which the sea "moaned" in active conversation and "trade" with Phlebas's sailors. Eliot makes the intentional choice to continue to anthropomorphize he sea, but to reduce it instead to a whispering force which lacklusterly tosses the body of Phlebas amongst its midst; a condition in stark contrast with several of the sources he alludes too.

Eliot's decision to state the occupation of this woman, clearly demarcates her role as a typist as significant. Throughout the ensuing stanzas of The Fire Sermon, the woman is described as "indifferent", leaving the advances of the man "unreproved" even if "undesired". She behaves in a quasi-catatonic state, "hardly aware of her departed lover", and her brain only capable of creating "half-formed" thoughts. This state, coupled with her role as a typist, could function as a greater societal commentary from Eliot. The role of the typist is one of blind reproduction, transcription the only mode of creation available to the woman; she is rendered a cog in a greater industrial system leading to her general indifference regarding her life.

Eliot's paraphrasing of Dante here caught my eye, both for the implications of the reference itself, and the change Eliot makes. In regards to content, using the quotes suggests physical proximity to Hell, imbuing the marching masses with the same posthumous qualities of the crowds mentioned in the aforementioned section of Dante. From Cantos III, Dante refers to the marching line of the dead as "These wretches, who never were alive." Suggesting that through a life of sin and abasement, these passed souls--- in the eyes of divinity---never truly lived at all, Eliot thus imbuing the same implication to his own hoard of the dead, creating an air of divine justice within the stanza. Additionally, it is important to note Eliot's change of word, altering the original "believe" from Dante, to "thought". This transformation suggests ignorance within the narrator, his previous experiences not prompting him to realize the sheer amount of casualties from whatever source the souls flow from. The could have several implications, but the one I see most prudent is in regards to War and the lack of proximity between the horrors of war and those who managed to shirk it.

I find the imperative nature of this line to be very interesting, especially as it is located in a segment of poetry rife with religious allusion. The tone of this greater segment is dramatic and desolate , describing "a heap of broken images, where the sun beats." Yet within this desert scene Eliot creates, after making multiple religious allusions, he provides this image of reprieve, the "shadow under this red rock." But beneath this "haven" is a pervasive feeling of hesitance and distrust, the narrator imploring both the reader to join him "under this red rock", and seemingly attempting to convince himself. Eliot's reference of Ezekiel 1, imbues the passage with a sense of divinity betrayed, and the narrator with a prophetic role. God stated in Ezekiel, "Be not thou rebellious like that rebellious house", creating conflict between the narrator and reader. This air of conflict is present throughout this section, as well as a sense of sin or danger in potenia lurking even within shelter; suggesting the Wasteland is a series of physical and metaphysical "traps". I feel that this alludes heavily to Eliot's conflicting views on Christianity which proceeded his eventual conversion.

The image of the "nymph departed" adds greater irony to the "grail quest" dogma of TWL (encouraged by the reference of Verlaine amongst compiled allusions we've already discussed). The novelty within the reference to Parsifal lies in the active role of the nymphs. Throughout TWL, female sexuality, and purity/virtue, has been portrayed as a metaphysical object to be seized from a woman. The chaste woman thus rendered a fertile land to be laid to waste, such dictum resounding through the stories of Philomena, Dido, and Leda, whom comprise the major female presence within TWL. A similar thematized female power lies in youth, the absence of that power witnessed in Sybil and Lil who lack beauty as a result of the actions of men. Yet in the Verlaine excerpt, the nymph's sexuality becomes a dangerous, powerful force, which aims to lure men away from the Holy Spear, and chastity itself. In this instance, the nymphs inherit a seemingly masculine, quasi-rapist role. And yet, within this deviation from the female trope of TWL there still lies a key difference between the female seductresses and their male prey. For Parsifal, his innocence and chastity serves a role of defense, the "pure fool's" lack of sexual experience and worldly knowledge proving his salvation. Once again, the man is spared from abasement and instead finds glory in this tale; his virtue not an object to be stolen, but his very defense against those that would harm him. However, in TWL "the nymphs are departed", thus ironizing the fragments of "grail quest" sequestered in the stanza. Within this desolate "waste", the nymphs have either been killed, perhaps the "white bodies naked on the low damp ground", as suggested by Lauren, left in a vulnerable, possibly violated state. Or (less bleakly) just simply "departed" of their own agency. In either situation, the implication is the same; The Holy Grail and Holy Spear are gone, there is nothing to be protected, and little remains to resurrect this wasteland. The white bodies lay strewn about the locality, the echo of Philomena's "Jug jug jug jug jug jug" crests the mostly silent landscape, and the woman is violated once again.

The title, “The Waste Land”, as noted by Angela, implies a state of vivacity overrun and destroyed by sterility, a change of figurative “seasons” implied by the title itself. However, despite "The Waste Land" being quite literally the first words the reader associates with the poem, it begins in a completely separate “season”, the title contradicted by vibrant transitory images in The Burial of the Dead, which opens with a scene of renewal, “[April] breeding lilacs out of the dead land” (1, 53). The poem dances through summer, language depicting relaxing and blissful scenes, even weaving through time itself as the narrator describes his most recent state when they “drank coffee and talked for an hour” (13, 53) as well as referencing the past, “when we were children”, and their past sledding and play. This reference to adulthood and childhood provides the reader with a vector of time, indicating that this migratory, seasonal cycle occurred for many years, blossoming springs and blissful summers, the leisurely tasks implying intrinsic ignorance. When a “Waste Land '' is finally described, however, it is not divulged until the second stanza. Eliot allows a full cycle of seasons to precede this barren realm, thus imbuing the land of “dry stone” and “stony rubbish” with a role of interruption of the seasonal cycle’s continuity. Early in Frazer’s the Golden Bough, he states that during the evolution of science and spirituality, as man began to develop systems for compartmentalizing the function of nature, there came a point when “the changes of the seasons [were] explained by the life and death of gods.” (4) By Eliot’s decision to delay this state of sterility, and instead begin with April ( a season of rebirth and renewal), somewhere within the realm of these stanzas, or the realm of the poem itself, God himself had died (following Frazer’s principle cited above). Eliot's decision to include the death of God in the spacetime of The Waste Land, as opposed to starting the poem posthumously cannot be ignored, and could perhaps have further implications regarding the “Grail Quest” underscoring the narrative as proved by Weston. By illustrating a time before the death of God, Eliot opens up the possibility of resurrection, “waste land” a possibly escapeable state. The poem itself perhaps functions as a man’s “spell” by Frazerian logic aiming to revive the lost divinity.

Within A Game of Chess, TWL, a poem already deeply circumscribed by circularity and failed cycle, finds yet another thematic cure introduced, love and its corresponding inversion. The title itself betrays its contents most basic nature, love being an intrinsically unifying force, through both life and death, as opposed to an adversarial match modeled after warfare itself. Additionally, the source of the title, A Game at Chess by Thomas Middleton, depicts seduction and sexual assault, the narrative perturbed by lust and thus distorting love; female virtue and sexuality reduced to a "pawn" in the schema of the play, and perhaps, TWL itself. This "game of chess" contains several knitted narratives, the longest regarding Lil. Within this stanza, a woman describes asking Lil "What you get married for if you don’t want children?" (165) as within her marriage, an institution held in highest esteem by both the divine and society, its very nature is inverted and abased. Notwithstanding her matrimony, her union in TWL does not yield progeny, instead the cycle of love and sex is only met with abortive resistance. The one description of birth we do receive is stained by Death, as she "nearly died of young George". The cycle of love and procreation is thus disrupted, and in turn abased by lust, her husband only desiring "a good time" after his return from war. Additionally, the trope of Philomel continues to pervade the women of TWL. The repeated motif of the violated woman gaining "inviolable voice" is satirically tinged, Philomena reduced to crying a vulgar "jug jug to dirty ears", simply another indistinguishable fragment amongst the "other withered stumps of time". This trope is reflected again onto Lil, her husband desiring her to remove all her teeth in place of a new set, purely for his own pleasure and lust, is greatly paradoxical. It is through this mutilation and abasement that she would regain seductive power over her husband, gaining a voice, and not losing him to "the others that will"; the image strikingly Philomenic. Within the perversion of love, and the consumption of lust, women continue to be a victim of their relationships with men. The marital canon of Adam and Eve rendered moot amongst the violence and death of TWL.

Yet again, Eliot continues along the thread of referencing historical, voiceless figures, and once again gender-inverts a character, Philomena joining the likes of the Hyacinth girl and Sosostris. In Nature, the male nightingale is the only party that sings, and does so in order to attract a mate. Philomena, having had her tongue cut out by Tereus, is rendered voiceless and must communicate with her sister through a tapestry. Upon her revenge she is transformed into a nightingale, and through this she is able to reclaim her voice, but only through an implied gender-inversion. A similar transformation is seen with Sybil, who inadvertently sacrifices her youth and fertility for the longevity of her oracle, losing an aspect of her womanhood in exchange for a semi-eternal voice.

Similarly to Nate, I took great interest in the role of Madame Sesotris from Crome Yellow and the way she is transformed into Madame Sosostris in the following stanza. In the original text, Sesotris is a cross-dressing con-man and palm reader, the merit and extent of her readings grounded only by the bounds of her imagination. But, in Burial of the Dead, the sorceress utilizes Tarot cards, a medium separate from herself. The introduction of this medium does not necessarily imbue the oracle with greater validity in her predictions, but it does limit the potential of sweeping superfluous death sentences and warnings of grave danger as she is referencing an outside source that is at the mercy of whatever supernatural or divine forces are at play. Nate also mentioned her warning to "fear death by water" claiming to see "crowds of people, walking round in a ring." and the reappearance of the phrase in the section Death By Water, which validates, to a certain extent, the Tarot cards, bu not necessarily Sosostris's divination abilities themselves as she is simply a messenger for the prophetic cards. In the final stanza of this section, Eliot writes, "A crowd flowed over London Bridge, so many/I had not thought death had undone so many/[each man] Flowed up the hill and down King William Street" (62-65) These lines combine both of the oracles visions of death by water and great hordes of people, creating a scene resembling that of the River Styx of the Grecian underworld in which the souls of the dead churn and crowd together to form the fluid contents of the river itself. This image, in combination with the reference to Dante, provides irony to Sosotris's warning, as one must already be dead to reach both the circles of Hell and the River Styx. While she may be literally valid in warning the narrator to "fear death by water", what good does it do when the narrator is already dead.

I found Eliot's decision to change the epigraph from the Conrad excerpt to the Metamorphosis excerpt very fascinating specifically pertaining to the concept of gender. Within the Ovid, a heavy emphasis is placed on Sybil's prophetic status, possessing centuries of experience and knowledge, she states “I will be viewed as non-existent, but still known as a voice: the fates will bequeath me a voice.” The image of her oracular voice persisting through mortal conventions only occurs as a result of her loss of youth, for if she remained a beautiful, desirable woman, it would dilute her prophetic status. Her lack of fecundity, in short, validates the strength of her voice, even as it begins to physically waver. In relation to the epigraph, Eliot makes the decision here when abandoning the Conrad, to begin the Waste Land from a position of physical infertility, but most interestingly mental sterility or dysfunction. In contrast to the Conrad, Sybil states that she will “be thought to never have loved and never to have delighted a God” , implying that her abundance, or “waste” of years has rendered her own memory and that of others diluted and dysfunctional. The Conrad, however, indicates a “waste” of memory itself; the vivid imagery rendering him petrified during his “moment of supreme truth”. One epigraph displays memorial sterility and despair as a result of immortality, and the alternate displays memorial fertility to an extreme degree, as a result of mortality. And yet, both of the epigraphs place an emphasis on this loss of voice when they conclude, Kurtz’s “cry that was no more than a breath”, and Sybil's eternally decaying state that will one day render her silent.