Reading the Waste Land : Modernism And The Limits Of Interpretation [Paperback]

This study of T.S. Eliot'sThe Waste Landguides the reader through the poem line by line, taking into account a number of previous interpretations. Aims to offer a part-by-part analysis of the poem with periodic summations and a meditation on the limits of interpretation and the problematic nature of reading in the late 20th century.

Professor of literature at Eckerd College,JEWEL SPEARS BROOKERis editor ofThe Placing of T. S. Elliot(1991) and the MLAApproaches to Teaching Eliots Poetry and Plays(1988). The lateJOSEPH BENTLEYwas professor of English and director of graduate studies in English at the University of South Florida. 

Extraordinarily stimulating... Reading The Waste Land is a brilliant enactment as well as demonstration of the proposition that the act of reading is a series of strategic decisions instituted by the reader, and that the value of interpretation is related more to something gained en route than to something waiting at the end. The sheer lucidity of this book grounding its reading of the text as it does in insights about reading it, makes it the single most important study of Eliot to have appeared in the last twenty years. It is essential reading.Southern Review 

Integrates the poets philosophical concerns with a coherent reading of The Waste Land that is both brilliant and persuasive. The authors guide us through the poem line by line, taking into account an impressive number of previous interpretations.... Of particular importance to Eliot scholars.. The book is [also] of compelling interest to the rest of us, the many who teach The Waste Land... for whom the book will be of great use as the single volume that we can turn to for a comprehensive account of that difficult poem. This combination of scholarly importance and pedagogical interest is a rare accomplishment indeed.American Literature 

Written by two indel“8