Eliot sets out in this poem an epic journey of self-inquiry for a modern reader. The modern writer is the modern reader, of course; the expectations that Eliot as a standard-bearer puts forth for his audience is not only to understand a literary work, but to delve deep into the hydra of sources that rhizomatically compose the work, and take those factors into account when reading the poem. He breaches the ostensible threshold between inspiration and expression by placing the protagonist in the poet’s body, or otherwise merging their consciousnesses, then, turducken-esque, wrapping the whole package in the voice of Tiresias.
This layering is extended through the authorial annotations compiled at the end, but linked in a scattering throughout the poem. That the “intellectually demanding verse” of Eliot’s pre-eminent work demanded readers “seek professional scholarship to help unpack the text’s complexities” by most critical measures (Anderson, 2) was not in itself unique. However, in making the notes to the poem, line-numbered and rich annotations, an essential published component, he preempts any subsequent criticism of this work, supplanting the usual primacy of the second-person (i.e., reviewers’) perspective. He includes a shield of meta-allusions---elucidating the roots of prior allusions---to ward against potential critiques unfounded in particularly uninformed digs of data. In constructing this thorny bramble of intermittently branched sources, Eliot invites the reader to wind and wend their way amongst the flowers from briar to briar. It is a delicate and dangerous dance to undertake, and Eliot I think is aware of the stakes he demands of his audience, the commitment on both an emotional and factual level. As demonstrated through recent posthumous collations and annotations of the author’s correspondence with Pound and various compatriots, meticulously curated by Eliot’s wife, Eliot was concerned with the reception his work would receive on poetic and critical levels. In attempting to create a work that needed to stimulate as much intellectually as emotionally---in capturing the prevalent mood of the times---he works to achieve his "objective correlate".
This layering is extended through the authorial annotations compiled at the end, but linked in a scattering throughout the poem. That the “intellectually demanding verse” of Eliot’s pre-eminent work demanded readers “seek professional scholarship to help unpack the text’s complexities” by most critical measures (Anderson, 2) was not in itself unique. However, in making the notes to the poem, line-numbered and rich annotations, an essential published component, he preempts any subsequent criticism of this work, supplanting the usual primacy of the second-person (i.e., reviewers’) perspective. He includes a shield of meta-allusions---elucidating the roots of prior allusions---to ward against potential critiques unfounded in particularly uninformed digs of data. In constructing this thorny bramble of intermittently branched sources, Eliot invites the reader to wind and wend their way amongst the flowers from briar to briar. It is a delicate and dangerous dance to undertake, and Eliot I think is aware of the stakes he demands of his audience, the commitment on both an emotional and factual level. As demonstrated through recent posthumous collations and annotations of the author’s correspondence with Pound and various compatriots, meticulously curated by Eliot’s wife, Eliot was concerned with the reception his work would receive on poetic and critical levels. In attempting to create a work that needed to stimulate as much intellectually as emotionally---in capturing the prevalent mood of the times---he works to achieve his "objective correlate".
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