He was a very depressed reactionary modernist poet.

yeah why are the two mutually exclusive

I got a really socialist vibe off some of his writings.

>>8141052
Which ones in particular?

>>8141062
Preludes. The way he describes the working class as 'hands' ie. only human resources. Or maybe he was just expressing his disdain for modern society.

>>8140873

I preferred H.L. Mencken, who was all of those things and entirely correct in everything he ever said.

I could be way off but from what I recall, he cheered up quite a lot after settling down with a nice wife and becoming a born again Christian. Ash Wednesday reflects this, I think.

>>8141071
Interesting, I never thought of that.
Do you mean in the second stanza?
If so, I personally think that is a continuation of the previous line:

With the other masquerades
That time resumes,
One thinks of all the hands
That are raising dingy shades
In a thousand furnished room.

I think this is expressing the tired banal repetition of everyday life.
This is repeated and expanded on in other stanzas, which might suggest that the tired routine has become dirtier over time, unnoticed.
Also note the final three lines.

Now this could be viewed as socialist, because I'm sure the bourgeois life is less tiresome.

>>8141090
There was a definite change in tone between the hollow men and ash Wednesday and between ash Wednesday and four quartets.
I view the three eras as his inferno, purgatorio and paradiso.
In ash Wednesday I think he was still struggling with how he and his poetry fit in to his new Christian faith.
In the four quartets he finally finds acceptance.

>>8141145
I always felt it was to do with their dehumanisation, either as a result of society (as mentioned re socialist interpretation) or because of the city sapping them of identity. It's the same with the "feet that press to early morning coffee stands", and he leans into it a bit when he described the "soul stretched tight across the skies", that is, the effect had on these people by their surroundings.

>>8141194
Interesting, that makes sense. It is dehumanizing.

Do you think the same thing about it in prufrock?

There will be time, there will be time
To prepare a face to meet the faces that you meet;
There will be time to murder and create,
And time for all the works and days of hands
That lift and drop a question on your plate;

>>8141173
>inferno, purgatory, paradiso

That sounds like a fantastic way of putting it. I haven't read much of him besides the "essentials." Do you think I should read him in chronological order?

>>8141250
Reading his major works in chronological order could help make sense of them, especially in light of his changing faith. However, the 3 eras are all fairly distinct so can be read separately.
I consider the Ariel poems to be part of the purgatorio phase but I think they can be read whenever.

>>8141218
Possibly to some extent, although if I was to speak generally, in prufrock the narrator is immersed in the society, whereas in preludes he is distant and analytical.
Maybe ironically, when he is distant he is able to be more charitable to the people in the flawed society, but in prufrock their vapidity and close-mindedness irritates him. It's as if he has to confront the reality that perhaps there isn't actually some great humanity or identity of which these people have been robbed. Either that, or it's too late.

>>8140888
but not an individual