T. S. Elliot references in TSOM lyrics

[oscu0]

I got really into Elliot recently and I found myself very liberated to write my own verse as a consequence — seeing how much was inspired by (or lifted from) him made me feel much better about how much TSOM inspires me

I wanted to collect a few references I've found here and provide some thoughts on their context. I'll organize them by poem.

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Gerontion
The opening and closing lines of Gerontion are echoed by the opening lines of Mother Russia:

Here I am, an old man in a dry month,
Being read to by a boy, waiting for rain.
...
Tenants of the house,
Thoughts of a dry brain in a dry season.

Compare to:

We serve an old man in a dry season
A lighthouse keeper in the desert sun
Dreamers of sleepers and white treason
We dream of rain and the history of the gun

Gerontion (little old man), like many of Elliot's best, is a poem about the perception of the state of post-World War I Europe, in this case as it's perceived by a man who has lived most of his life in the nineteenth century. In retrospective it is hard not to imagine that Eldritch felt some parallels to the fall of the Soviet Union that must have seemed inevitable at that point (although I don't know if it seemed as obvious in the West). As always, every accusation is a confession and a transparently anti-American song says something about the Soviet gerontocracy (see what I did there?) as well.

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The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock
One of the only well-known Elliot poems that to me does not scan to me as being about the first world war, and far more conventional in its use of language than what most people think of Elliot (guess that would make it Vision Thing?). Nevertheless it is remarkably hard to interpret and disjointed, perhaps intentionally, expressing the disjointed internal state of the narrator, above all his anxieties about his (future or potential) relationships.
The lines from the second stanza (if that's an appropriate term to use with regard to modernist poetry. I'm not convinced)

The yellow fog that rubs its back upon the window-panes,
The yellow smoke that rubs its muzzle on the window-panes,
Licked its tongue into the corners of the evening,
Lingered upon the pools that stand in drains,
Let fall upon its back the soot that falls from chimneys,
Slipped by the terrace, made a sudden leap,
And seeing that it was a soft October night,
Curled once about the house, and fell asleep.

are referenced in Nine While Nine, which is about the narrator's internal exploration of a past relationship. By moving from a potential to a past, failed relationship, the yellow smoke is transformed into frost:

And the lipstick on my cigarettes
Frost upon the windowpane
Nine while nine, and I'm waiting
For the train....

Amphetamine Logic also contains a reference to this poem, to the lines

In the room the women come and go
Talking of Michelangelo.

I will try to come back to this, but for the moment I do not understand the meaning of this allusion.

[oscu0]

The Waste Land
The (impossible to recap) Waste Land makes numerous allusions to the legend of the Fisher King. The central image of the poem, the titular wasteland, is created by the fisher king, who is the occasional narrator, as in a part of section III, "The Fire Sermon", that should be instantly familiar:

While I was fishing in the dull canal
On a winter evening round behind the gashouse
Musing upon the king my brother’s wreck
And on the king my father’s death before him.
White bodies naked on the low damp ground
And bones cast in a little low dry garret,

The legend of the Fisher King, to recap, is part of Arthurian mythos that describes a king as the physical embodiment of his lands; in classical tellings the king is wounded and the wound renders the kingdom barren. The connection to Eldritch's lyrics about dance culture is obvious and very funny: clearly he renders himself the fisher king whose state affects the state of his fiefdom as it dances to his music:

The bodies on the naked, on the low, damp ground
In the violet hour to the violent sound

I wonder if the whole g*th thing should therefore also explained by some wound on Eldritch's thigh or groin.

There's also a similarity between Marian's tone, German sections and the specific choice of metaphors therein, and the following lines of The Waste Land:

—Yet when we came back, late, from the Hyacinth garden,
Your arms full, and your hair wet, I could not
Speak, and my eyes failed, I was neither
Living nor dead, and I knew nothing,
Looking into the heart of light, the silence.
Oed’ und leer das Meer.

The last line translates to "empty and desolate is the sea", itself a reference to Wagner's Tristand und Isolde. The sea for Elliot represents his internal state, in this case emptiness and depression that the narrator felt in lieu of some romantic excitement, or his lack of reaction due to that particular person:

Damyata: The boat responded
Gaily, to the hand expert with sail and oar
The sea was calm, your heart would have responded
Gaily, when invited, beating obedient
To controlling hands

Contrast with Eldritch's Meer, which seems to rather represent a state of active internal distress and perceived abandonment:

Was ich kann und was ich könnte
Weiß ich gar nicht mehr
Gib mir wieder etwas Schönes
Zieh mich aus dem Meer
Ich höre dich rufen, Marian
Kannst du mich schreien hören?
Ich bin hier allein
Ich höre dich rufen, Marian
Ohne deine Hilfe
Verliere ich mich in diesem Ort

Translated:

What I can and cannot [do]
I just do not know anymore
Give me something beautiful
Drag me out of the sea
I hear you calling out, Marian
Can you hear me screaming?
I am here alone
I hear you calling out, Marian
Without your help I am lost here

[paint it black]

The violet hour is in itself Eliot no?

Also the razor cuts and the shriek subsides.

[oscu0]

In the room the women come and go
Talking of Michelangelo.

I will try to come back to this, but for the moment I do not understand the meaning of this allusion.

Oh, I guess that makes Eldritch Michelangelo, doesn't it?

Women (Women, women, women)
And the women come and go
Talk (Talk, talk, talk)
Talking about me like they know

[oscu0]

The violet hour is in itself Eliot no?

Also the razor cuts and the shriek subsides.

Right, "the violet hour" is from the Waste Land, I must have missed it. I think it just means twilight for both Eldritch and Elliot, though. Elliot commented that the passage marks the return of a fisherman home late at night.

I haven't read Sweeney Erect before, so I didn't catch that one either. "A people eat each other" is also a reference, to the Sweeney Todd murders themselves if not the poem about them.

[FadeInto1]

Marian is a good one, because it's fairly indirect, and shows that Eldritch is, whether he likes the term or not, a poet more than simply a song lyricist.

We know the song's title appears to have its origins with Hussey, who has used the name elsewhere, but as is tradition, Eldritch had no interest in using Hussey's words. For whatever reason, somewhere along the way it appears that he saw fit to keep the title and little else (maybe the song was already called that, and there was no appetite to change the title? Who knows). He's certainly not speaking about the same Marian Hussey was.

Anyway. The album calls it "Marian (Version)". "Version" is one of the variant words in a cryptic crossword clue which denotes an anagram. Marina is an Eliot poem which is based in some way on Marina from Pericles. Whether the poem is a re-telling, an impression, or an extension of Pericles is probably up to you or I, as much as anybody, but it's told from the point of view of Pericles, as he comes to recall and then recognise his daughter Marina. In the play Marina represents a steadfast moral certainty: We are inspired by her unwavering virtue and the resilience of moral vision, and her total resistance to corruption - and indeed, these attributes protect her as she navigates a hostile world.

Without going into the whole plot of Pericles, a key point is that Pericles, Prince Of Tyre, returns to Tarsus where he left his daughter, and is told (falsely) that she is dead, at which point he takes to the sea in grief, and vows to mourn forever. At the end of the play, he and Marina are reunited without knowing who the other is, and as they each share memories with the other, they come to recognise each other. I think the Eliot poem is drawing on this part of the story, though others have suggested it takes place during Pericles' time at sea.

I don't think that Eldritch is directly re-doing Marina (or Pericles), and I don't think he's telling his story specifically from the perspective of Pericles (though I could be wrong - perhaps it's Eldritch who is writing of Pericles' time at sea in mourning?). I think the song Marian is a "A defeated, compromised wretch like me is only motivated by the possibility that my Marina might offer me some redemption" song, of a kind that he and Leonard Cohen often like to do, and I think he's deliberately trying to draw on the same source material as Eliot, rather than directly allude to Eliot himself. Perhaps this was all a simple as a writing exercise for him, and perhaps he was not otherwise terribly invested in this song?

Off the top of my head - and do correct me - there are no direct quotes or overt references to Marina in Marian (as opposed to say Prufrock, which shows up again and again in Eldritch's words), but the poem does evoke certain nautical/shipwright imagery, and Pericles is also naturally preoccupied with shores and seas and shipwrecks - all the sort of iconography Eldritch continues to draw on to this day, and which which is very very apparent in Marian.

[The Violet Hour]

I got really into Elliot recently and I found myself very liberated to write my own verse as a consequence — seeing how much was inspired by (or lifted from) him made me feel much better about how much TSOM inspires me

I wanted to collect a few references I've found here and provide some thoughts on their context. I'll organize them by poem.

Your posts about T.S. Eliot are quite uncanny and timely, as I myself have been re-reading a couple of his poems as I'm reading Waiting For Another War. Eliot has always been one of my favourite poets since I was first introduced to him in high school English and of course through TSOM (hence, my handle on this forum!); I read his complete poems a long time ago, and think maybe that I'm due to re-read the whole lot again. I'm in the same mindset as yourself right now of reading and writing too, except with Leonard Cohen which I'm revisiting as well, but that's another topic of conversation. Thank you for posting your thoughts on this!

[The Violet Hour]

The violet hour is in itself Eliot no?

Also the razor cuts and the shriek subsides.

Right, "the violet hour" is from the Waste Land, I must have missed it. I think it just means twilight for both Eldritch and Elliot, though. Elliot commented that the passage marks the return of a fisherman home late at night.

I haven't read Sweeney Erect before, so I didn't catch that one either. "A people eat each other" is also a reference, to the Sweeney Todd murders themselves if not the poem about them.

There are other references to "violet" in the poem; what do you make of these?:

"At the violet hour, when the eyes and back
Turn upward from the desk, when the human engine waits
Like a taxi throbbing waiting..."

"At the violet hour, the evening hour that strives
Homeward, and brings the sailor home from sea..."

"What is the city over the mountains
Cracks and reforms and bursts in the violet air..."

"And bats with baby faces in the violet light
Whistled, and beat their wings
And crawled head downward down a blackened wall..."


If you haven't read it yet, there is a direct reference as well in "The Damage Done" to the poem "The Hollow Men"; both the song and the poem end with the same line and have allusions to death, emptiness and warfare:

"This is the way the world ends
Not with a bang but a whimper."

[oscu0]

Off-topic, but given Eldritch's love of drug references, "The Damage Done" is also likely a reference to "The Needle and the Damage Done" by Neil Young. The latter, according to Young, is about generational damage of the hippie generation falling en masse to drug use (or at least him feeling that that was happening). But overall "The Damage Done" is largely undecipherable — maybe Eldritch's substituting films in the chorus and radio in the encore for herion in Young's song? Seems a bit sophomoric to me.

[oscu0]

I did wonder how Eldritch didn't reference The Hollow Men, which is, I can't say the best, but surely my favorite of Elliot's works. Thank you for correcting me

The violet hour as twilight seems to work for most of these. A source I've found interprets the repetition in a section about the clerk that you quoted as lyrical reinforcement of "the dailyness of coming home"; I think the repetition of "violet hour" serves the same purpose, it is the first thing a person sees when getting off work (for like 4 months a year here up North, anyway).

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The album calls it "Marian (Version)".

I remember reading in the Sisters FAQ that "version" is used here in the reggae instrumental sense, of all things — the record company complained that the voices were too quiet so the song was facetiously designated an instrumental version. Extremely Web 1.0 source.

Your interpretation certainly works — somebody ought to make a similar tread about Shakespeare references in TSOM lyrics. Eldritch compared himself to Prospero in a recent interview.

[H. Blackrose]

Your interpretation certainly works — somebody ought to make a similar tread about Shakespeare references in TSOM lyrics. Eldritch compared himself to Prospero in a recent interview.

This all ties together, as The Tempest is heavily referenced in The Waste Land.

... on a tangent, I wonder whether Hussey was tweaking Eldritch's love for Eliot, and whether (30 years later) Si Denbigh was tweaking him for never releasing "Summer"

[H. Blackrose]

The album calls it "Marian (Version)".

I remember reading in the Sisters FAQ that "version" is used here in the reggae instrumental sense, of all things — the record company complained that the voices were too quiet so the song was facetiously designated an instrumental version. Extremely Web 1.0 source.

Absolutely right. A lot of the ingenuous "readings" of TSOM lyrics have to be based on the idea that Eldritch is flat-out lying in interviews/published texts.

And of course Marian was a real woman in Hamburg, though that probably wasn't her real name.

[FadeInto1]

The album calls it "Marian (Version)".

I remember reading in the Sisters FAQ that "version" is used here in the reggae instrumental sense, of all things — the record company complained that the voices were too quiet so the song was facetiously designated an instrumental version. Extremely Web 1.0 source.

Absolutely right. A lot of the ingenuous "readings" of TSOM lyrics have to be based on the idea that Eldritch is flat-out lying in interviews/published texts.

And of course Marian was a real woman in Hamburg, though that probably wasn't her real name.

The FAQ on the website is written by the same guy who tells those jokes in those interviews, and itself contains many facetious statements. And we know that Eldritch has specifically overstated and misrepresented the position of record labels over the years, and we know that he lies in interviews.

The name Marian originates in Hussey lyrics, regardless of whether Eldritch projects his own meaning onto it. That's a matter of fact. The thing about "version" denoting anagrams in crosswords is a matter of fact. That the name Marian can be rearranged into Marina is a matter of fact. That Marina is an Eliot poem is a fact. That Marina is about Pericles is a fact.
These are not things which require us to take Eldritch at his word.

Things that require a degree of speculation but which are broadly reliable:
-Eldritch has been consistent in his claim about taking a keen interest in crosswords, but more importantly others have verified that. So the cryptic crossword interpretation of "Version" is just as likely as the dub reggae one, if we exclude Eldritch's own statements.
-Eldritch appears to have specifically considered the relationship between the work of Eliot and Shakespeare elsewhere in his writing

I think that at the very least, the parallels are not accidental or unconscious.

[FadeInto1]

Your interpretation certainly works — somebody ought to make a similar tread about Shakespeare references in TSOM lyrics. Eldritch compared himself to Prospero in a recent interview.

I think that Eldritch generally arrives at Shakespeare via Eliot. I've not done an analysis of it or nothin' but I'd bet that there's more Eldritch references to Eliot referencing Shakespeare than Eldritch references to Shakespeare

[The Violet Hour]

I did wonder how Eldritch didn't reference The Hollow Men, which is, I can't say the best, but surely my favorite of Elliot's works. Thank you for correcting me

The violet hour as twilight seems to work for most of these. A source I've found interprets the repetition in a section about the clerk that you quoted as lyrical reinforcement of "the dailyness of coming home"; I think the repetition of "violet hour" serves the same purpose, it is the first thing a person sees when getting off work (for like 4 months a year here up North, anyway).

I believe The Hollow Men was the first poem of his I read and one of my favourites too, and anything that makes reference to "Heart Of Darkness", and by that turn "Apocalypse Now" was going to catch my attention And of course, Dennis Hopper almost quotes "Prufrock" in "Apocalypse Now", so...

I agree with the violet hour/twilight reading as well; this is life for me too, as I too live in twilight at least a third of the year in a Northern country on the other side of the Atlantic

[H. Blackrose]

The name Marian originates in Hussey lyrics, regardless of whether Eldritch projects his own meaning onto it. That's a matter of fact. The thing about "version" denoting anagrams in crosswords is a matter of fact. That the name Marian can be rearranged into Marina is a matter of fact. That Marina is an Eliot poem is a fact. That Marina is about Pericles is a fact.

That another anagram for Marina is a species of sea slug also fits in admirably with the nautical theme, and requires several fewer leaps of logic.

The problem is not with your interpretation (I say "your", although I swear I've seen it elsewhere), it's that you seem to be suggesting it as the "real" interpretation, i.e. what Eldritch really intended?

[oscu0]

The name Marian originates in Hussey lyrics, regardless of whether Eldritch projects his own meaning onto it. That's a matter of fact. The thing about "version" denoting anagrams in crosswords is a matter of fact. That the name Marian can be rearranged into Marina is a matter of fact. That Marina is an Eliot poem is a fact. That Marina is about Pericles is a fact.

That another anagram for Marina is a species of sea slug also fits in admirably with the nautical theme, and requires several fewer leaps of logic.

The problem is not with your interpretation (I say "your", although I swear I've seen it elsewhere), it's that you seem to be suggesting it as the "real" interpretation, i.e. what Eldritch really intended?

Anything more complicated than "a very hungry caterpillar" runs the risk of being interpreted in a manner not intended by the author. The only reason to consider the author's intended interpretation to be the most important one is believing the primary function of art is didactic. This is not what most people feel about art, yet a lot of people but a lot of emphasis on what the author meant. I understand that it's interesting to think what the person who made the thing was thinking, but engaging with an artwork shouldn't hinge on it.

[FadeInto1]

Guys. It's a thread about Eliot references. If we're calling something a "reference" we're generally going to be calling it intentional. Let's not split the atom here or else we'll have to start saying things like "hermeneutics" and "authorial intentionalism" and I promise you, anyone who arrived here because they like Eliot is not going to enjoy that.

The name Marian originates in Hussey lyrics, regardless of whether Eldritch projects his own meaning onto it. That's a matter of fact. The thing about "version" denoting anagrams in crosswords is a matter of fact. That the name Marian can be rearranged into Marina is a matter of fact. That Marina is an Eliot poem is a fact. That Marina is about Pericles is a fact.

That another anagram for Marina is a species of sea slug also fits in admirably with the nautical theme, and requires several fewer leaps of logic.

The problem is not with your interpretation (I say "your", although I swear I've seen it elsewhere), it's that you seem to be suggesting it as the "real" interpretation, i.e. what Eldritch really intended?

That is a very bizarre thing to say. This isn't a thread about general interpretations of Eldritch's lyrics, it's a thread about Eliot references in Eldritch's lyrics. The parameters of the discussion require us to assume Eldritch's intentions, insofar as we're literally here to discuss "I think he intended to evoke Eliot when he wrote that". The reference I brought up, I described as "indirect", and it eventually seemed necessary to lay out a chain of reasoning as to why I considered it likely that it was a reference to Eliot. That's all. I'm not coming to your house and demanding you adopt my worldview or anything.

Fair enough if you want to call my theory a stretch - and I did already call it indirect, to be fair - but you "seem to be suggesting" with absolute objective certainty that it was not Eldritch's intention to evoke Eliot. Which is no more or less absurd than what you're admonishing me for.

The point is this: For as long as we're talking about one writer referencing another, we're presuming the intentions of that writer. It's built into the brief for this thread. If this is objectionable to you for whatever reason, you should feel free to start a thread called "Eldritch lyrics which are certainly, categorically and conclusively not intentional Eliot references, and into which no discussion to that effect will be entered". You could go through YCBTW line by line, and repeatedly write "this line contains no references to TS Eliot".

Oh, and just on the topic of leaps of logic: I realise you're being facetious to (almost) make a point, but your Armina thing actually requires a significantly larger leap of logic in that it requires you to invent a whole new definition of the word "nautical". The Bay City Rollers' "Shang A Lang" is full of nautical references too, if you expand the definition of "nautical" to include the phrase "shang a lang". Aeroplanes are nautical vehicles if you expand the definition of "nautical" to include things pertaining to air travel. I just thought I'd let you know that you might want to google the definition of a word before using it for the first time, just in case you make a habit of misinterpreting the meaning of words while refuting people's interpretation of the meaning of words.