Mistah Kurtz — he dead.
A penny for the Old Guy
I
We are the hollow men
We are the stuffed men
Leaning together
Headpiece filled with straw. Alas!
Our dried voices, when
We whisper together
Are quiet and meaningless
As wind in dry grass
Or rats’ feet over broken glass
In our dry cellar
Shape without form, shade without colour,
Paralysed force, gesture without motion;
Those who have crossed
With direct eyes, to death’s other Kingdom
Remember us — if at all — not as lost
Violent souls, but only
As the hollow men
The stuffed men.
II
Eyes I dare not meet in dreams
In death’s dream kingdom
These do not appear:
There, the eyes are
Sunlight on a broken column
There, is a tree swinging
And voices are
In the wind’s singing
More distant and more solemn
Than a fading star.
Let me be no nearer
In death’s dream kingdom
Let me also wear
Such deliberate disguises
Rat’s coat, crowskin, crossed staves
In a field
Behaving as the wind behaves
No nearer —
Not that final meeting
In the twilight kingdom
III
This is the dead land
This is cactus land
Here the stone images
Are raised, here they receive
The supplication of a dead man’s hand
Under the twinkle of a fading star.
Is it like this
In death’s other kingdom
Waking alone
At the hour when we are
Trembling with tenderness
Lips that would kiss
Form prayers to broken stone.
IV
The eyes are not here
There are no eyes here
In this valley of dying stars
In this hollow valley
This broken jaw of our lost kingdoms
In this last of meeting places
We grope together
And avoid speech
Gathered on this beach of the tumid river
Sightless, unless
The eyes reappear
As the perpetual star
Multifoliate rose
Of death’s twilight kingdom
The hope only
Of empty men.
V
Here we go round the prickly pear
Prickly pear prickly pear
Here we go round the prickly pear
At five o’clock in the morning.
Between the idea
And the reality
Between the motion
And the act
Falls the Shadow
For Thine is the Kingdom
Between the conception
And the creation
Between the emotion
And the response
Falls the Shadow
Life is very long
Between the desire
And the spasm
Between the potency
And the existence
Between the essence
And the descent
Falls the Shadow
For Thine is the Kingdom
For Thine is
Life is
For Thine is the
This is the way the world ends
This is the way the world ends
This is the way the world ends
Not with a bang but a whimper.
I believe that the siginificance of the first line of the Lord’s prayer are the hollow men trying to ask God for forgiveness. They keep trying to pray to him but are unable to get past the first line because they dont actually believe in what they are saying.
As always the a poem can be analysed anyway, but i also feel that this poem has a Post Trench War feel. The hollow men are those ravaged by the horrors, but have survived. They wander the carnage dazed and horrified. They too should have died. There are much references to “Deaths other kingdom”, and they feel that they are in some horrible purgatory after the neverending war. The second half of the poem deals with thoughts on religion and spirtualsim; after all, how can there be a god if he allows such destruction? They try to remember the Lords prayer, but only get so far as “For thine is the Kingdom”, and the fact that they can never get to the second part “The power and the glory” shows they feel there is no God and beleive in nothing. And this is how the world ends, not with a bang from the war, but the desolation and the lack of spiritualism (theyre hollow now, if you will). I like to think. Its a powerful reminder on war that all governments should recall before going to war. Hint hint.
This poem also deals a bit with disillusionment after WWI. Eliot’s line at the end of section 2, “behaving as the wind behaves”, can be connected with the world’s belief that great things would happen after the war and in reality the post-war era included nothing but sadness. you can hear the wind, but you can’t see it
to SN –
The Shadow falls between the idea/reality, motion/act, not ambiguously amoung these concepts. The idea is what is worshipped, the concept thrown out. The motion is worshipped, the act carelessly discarded. The fifth section, at least, is a direct reference to religion (for thine is the kingdom, etc.), and what he is trying to tell us about religion is that it is focusing in the wrong places (the shadow). The poem makes absolutely direct connections to religion, and whether or not there are other things in it about war or sexuality, the religious references are there. Also, no one yet has commented on the fact that the world ends in a whimper. If it was referencing war, the world would end in a bang. The world ends in a whimper because of these peoples screwed up beliefs and lack of testicles. They choose to not pursue their own religious beliefs, so they wind up following other hollow men into nothingness.
I have been rather depressed by the Mr. Neilsen comment concerning “sexual context” in the poem. Well, it certainly is freudian-like but apart from agreeing with the comment about reading Konrad’s novel, I’d also like to add that from my point of view the poem also has to do with Dante’s Inferno, since these are not “lost violent souls” but “the hollow men, the stuffed men”, though, naturally, Dante is not enough to be able to appreciate Eliot’s poetry properly. As for “freudian” comments, I think that they merely simplify things, thus leaving interpreters no chance to really understand poetry or anything else. The comment in question shows quite explicitly how a philosophical masterpiece may be spoiled by a careless reader.
Most all of you are truly missing the point. The true concepts of these poem cannot be percieved without reading Joseph Conrads, “Heart of Darkness”. This poem is an allusion to this book in every way. The Hollow Men is refering to all men in the world who live their lives with no purpose except to pursue money and waste their lives. These are the Hollow Men, on their trip to the after life, finally realizing where they went wrong; but it is already too late. Although this poem an apply to all men, Eliot probably was refering to the main characters of Heart of Darkness, such as Marlow.
Although, I dare not guess what Eliot was thinking, as I try to see meaning in this work, I see someone talking about the desparity of waking up on the wrong side of the afterlife. Notice, how death’s other Kingdom is capitalized, while when speaking of the kingdom he finds himself in, there is no capitalization. The constant use of the word “death” seems to suggest we are in afterlife discussion here. 🙂
The poem shows Eliots personal struggle with the concept of love in a sexual context. The shadow about which he speaks is his shame, he cannot love in a sexual way as he sees sex as an idea, reality motion and act, conception, creation, desire and spasm, potency, essence and descent.
Whether he was impotent, premature or celibate or just scared is neither apparent or of any consequence, it is his reading of the act that ties this poem together and makes it so powerfull.
SN
Throughout this poem, I find a sense of helplessness and insecurity. Everything seems to be a mystery not only for the reader but also for the protagonist as well. Yet through the hoplessness, there is a sense that there is more to life than just fragments of what was left behind. There’s more to live for!
I love that show!
I think a lot of you guys are missing the epigram at the top of the poem: “Mistah Kurtz — he dead.” This is a quote from the novel Heart of Darkness. Eliot wants you to keep this book in mind while reading his poem, and the book doesn’t have anything to do with any World Wars or even America.
this poem reminds my of my huge genitals…amazing
I think the poem is depicting how men, especially war veterans, feel when they have no purpose or meaning in their lives. They feel empty or “hollow”, and they don’t want the “eyes” to look at them, or even look back at them, because it would only reflect the pain and emptiness in their souls. Just a thought.
The hollow men was written in 1925 after the World War. Eliot seems to be using imagery to reflect a post war society. The world at this time was just recovering from the war and many felt that the death of many was for nothing, and caused the people to have a sense of liflessness, and lack of connection between two people. This is clearly what Eliot is trying to depict.
This is the situation to which romanticism in poerty and idealism in philosophy have brought Eliot.
becuse he was American when he wrote this. what happened afterward doesnt matter. a dead man has no citizenship.
I think you’ll find that towards the end of his life Eliot began to denounce his American citizenship. With this in mind I do not understand why he is featured so prominantly on this website as an “American Poet.”
The poem makes a person think too quickly of insanity, but, I think, when you look, or read, more closely, a truly sane person is revealed in the midst of insanity. It is as if this person, the poem’s protagonist, has seen through the fog of human nature and transcended to a level beyond, where he/she looks back at us and see how screwed up we still are.
it’a a difficult poem but the reference to the Grail myth clarifies it a bit. I like the final part where quotations, phrases, songs and visions are added one to the next without apparent cohesion. How could a poet who wanted to show the fragmentation od thwe modern world write a well written poem?
There’s more. Eliot says ” these fragments I have shored against my ruins” isn’t it clear? Carla from Italy
This is one of my favorite poems of all times. I fell in love with it when my highschool teacher read it to us in class. I’m surprised there are no comments on this yet.