BBC Arts

TS Eliot Into 'The Waste Land' (2022x8)

Air date: Oct 13, 2022

TS Eliot Into 'The Waste Land' marks the centenary of one of the defining poems of the 20th century, The Waste Land. TS Eliot's groundbreaking work first exploded into the world on 15 October 1922 and has continued to resonate with successive generations. For decades, Eliot actively discouraged biographical interpretations of his work, developing an ‘impersonal theory’ of poetry in which the private life of a poet was deemed irrelevant. Instead, numerous scholars have been guided by Eliot's own seven pages of footnotes to the poem. But in 2020, there were dramatic new revelations that demonstrated how, behind Eliot's mask, there was a much more personal story to be found within The Waste Land – which can now at last be explored.