Cultural and moral decay: In T.S. Eliot’s The Waste Land

Pages:27-28
Suman Yadav1 and Virender Yadav2 (Department of English, Singhania Universty Pacheri Bari, Jhunjhunu, Rajasthan2)

T.S.Eliot’s The Waste Land is a vivid description of the cultural and moral degeneration of the world. Here everything is in a state of chaos and confusion. Today’s wastelanders have no cultural values to sustain them. Ethical values have lost their charm once and for all. These lines prove it clearly: “The good want power, but to weep barren tears, the powerful goodness wants: worse need for them. The wise want love; and those who love want wisdom; and all best things are thus confused to ill.”1