Topic : Use of Symbolism in "The Waste land”

Name: Nikunj Bhatti

Roll no.:17

M.A. Semester: 3

Enrollment No.: 14101005

Year: 2014-16

Paper no.: 9 (Modernist Literature)

Email id.: nikunjbhatti332@gmail.com

Submitted to: Department of English

Maharaja Krishnakumarsinhji Bhavnagar University

Symbolism Symbolism is a literary

element used in literature to

help readers understand a

literary work.

Symbolism is a figure of

speech that is used when an

author wants to create a

certain mood or emotion in a

work of literature.

Symbols Can be…

An object

Picture

Written word

Sound

Language

The Fisher

king

Water

Religion

Drought

Human

Characters

City

River

Landscape

Thunder

Season

Buddhism

Symbols in The Waste land

From ‘Ritual to Romance’

The book is seen for the

connection between ancient

fertility rights and Christianity.

It includes the evolution of the

Fisher King into early

representation of Jesus Christ as

a fish.

Eliot shows the Fisher King as

symbolic of humanity robbed of

its sexuality potency in the

modern world and connected to

the meaninglessness of urban

existence.

The Fisher king

DeathBirth

Symbols of

Water

Water provides

solace

Water cleanses

Water brings relief

Although water has regenerating possibility of

restoring life and fertility, it can also lead to

drawing and death, as in the case of Phlebas the

sailor from the Waste Land. Traditionally water

can be baptism, Christianity and the figure of

Jesus Christ.

“Ganga was sunken, and the limp leaves waited for rain,

While the black clouds gathered far distant, over Himavant.”

I.A.Richards and Cleanth

Brooks believe the poem to

be religious.

The Christian myth of

King Fisher shows that

regeneration is possible

through penance and

suffering.

The poem ends with

“ Datta. Dayadhvam. Damyata.

Shantih Shantih Shanti ”

Vedic recitation ends with Universal theme of

nonviolence and peace.

Death

Drought

“Here is no water, but only rock

Rock and no water and the sandy road

There is not even silence in the mountains

But dry sterile thunder without rain”

The characters in the poem are

not the only devices used to

invoke symbolism. The tarot card

characters Phoenician sailor, the

hanged man, the repeated biblical

references and other literary

references all serve to touch upon

symbolic value and also function

as objective correlatives

The Sibyl, Ezra Pound, Madame

Sosostris…..

Human Characters

Tiresias

Cities are destroyed, rebuilt and destroyed

mirroring the cyclical downfall of cultures.

City

River

The poem refers to Ganges

in Himalaya. River is called

the mother of civilization.

The river

symbolizes the

flow continuity

of life.

Season

Summer refers to joy, Winter refers to grimness

and death. It refers to barrenness.

Buddhism

Non-violence

and peace

Landscape

Landscape

River Bank

Unreal City

Mountain

Thunder

There are many

mythical tales about

thunder in the Holy

books of

Mahabharata and

Ramayana. It

symbolizes the coming

of good or evil time.

Thank You