Essay: How do Eliot and Yeats present spirituality?

How do Eliot and Yeats present spirituality?

Introduction:

Spirituality is a reoccurring theme of both Eliot and Yeats, with Eliot exploring it in many of his poems especially ‘Journey of the Magi’ and ‘The Wasteland’ and Yeats in ‘The Second Coming’, both looking into spiritual dryness and the futility of religion.

Religious Expectations

In both the ‘journey of the Magi’ and ‘Second Coming’ the poets both explore the way that religion builds up expectations but never fulfils them. Eliot takes on the voice of the Magi and recalls their journey to Jesus’ birth which they only found ‘satisfactory’. This contrasts with the normal representation of Jesus’ birth as a miraculous event, and undermines in effect the entire religion. The word ‘satisfactory’ matches the neutral tone adopted throughout, and the Magi don’t seem particularly enthused by their experience, describing it as a ‘hard and bitter agony’. Instead of being the amazing divine revelation everyone thinks it was Eliot makes it sound painful and tortuous, perhaps because while Jesus was born the Magi were fully aware that he would die. This futility and lack of the joy and emotion associated with spirituality is also explored in ‘The Second Coming’, where Yeats asks ‘Surely some revelation is at hand’. The word ‘surely’ suggests desperation for some sort of spiritual experience, and is also suggestive of someone trying to reassure themselves that something will happen.  This lack of hope and spirituality is reflected in the way Yeats thinks that ‘the best lack all conviction’ suggesting that even the people who should know about these things like the ‘Magi’ have grown disbelieving or despondent, with the lack of spiritual rewards driving people away. Both poets might be saying that after the desperation for a spiritual revelation fades people are left spiritless empty and bereft.

Spiritual Doubt

Both poets also explore spiritual doubt, with Eliot portraying the Magi as uncertain and worried about their journey. The Magi say that while on their journey ‘there were times (they) regretted’ and heard ‘voices sing in (their) ears, saying / that this was all folly’. This is not only an experience common to many people seeking spiritual enlightenment it also reflects the fact that historically, the Magi were uncertain of what they would find in Bethlehem, only having the prophecies of Judaism (a religion unknown and unfollowed by them) to go on. Spiritual doubt is a universal theme, and the ‘voices’ that ‘sing’ to them could be their minds warning them that this is folly. It could also represent the disbelieving and negligent Israelites or even the devil trying to dissuade them from following the star and finding the baby Jesus. Likewise in the ‘Second Coming’ Yeats remarks that the ‘ceremony of innocence is drowned’ perhaps connotes that people have been disillusioned or that their doubts have got the better of hem, or that their doubts were proved to be right. Either way Yeats does not convey much hope, stating it as a fact, and creates a sense of the lost hope and disbelief of the post WW1 world. Yeats does not give any room for disagreement whereas Eliot leaves it much more open, letting the reader decide whether Jesus’ birth was really a miracle or not. This could perhaps suggest that the pursuit of spirituality requires resilience and intellectual questioning and strength, and Eliot could be suggesting in a modern world we have no patience to work hard for a true spiritual experience, or perhaps that it is right to have doubts but you must push through them to find the reward or in the Magi’s case the lack of one.

Sacrifices for Spirituality

Eliot explores the sacrifices that have to be made in the search for spirituality. In ‘Journey of the Magi’ Eliot uses the present participle when the Magi are recalling their arduous ‘journey’, (which is repeated to show how hard it was), to make the Magi sound tired, and their constant listing of things that happened illustrates how exasperated they became.  ‘And’ is also repeated at the beginning of the four lines of listing, reflecting the way the journey grew harder as well as making their journey seem like it was constantly full of problems. Their journey from hell is contrasted to the comfort of their ‘summer palaces’ and ‘terraces’ for  ‘villages dirty’, with Eliot using inversed word order to place emphasis on the negative word ‘dirty’ in order that the reader take that away as their prominent impression of the journey. In line 9 their old life is shown to be one of supreme luxury, with ‘silken girls bringing sherbet’, and the sibilance reflecting the smoothness of their home. The word ‘bringing’ implies that the servants where submissive and respectful, quite the opposite of the ‘camel men’ they take with them who instead spend their time ‘grumbling and cursing’. This juxtaposition of their luxurious lifestyle to the discomfort of their journey emphasizes the amount that the Magi gave up to seek the spiritual experience they hoped for, indicating how important it was to them and how much they were willing to give up for it. It could also be suggestive of the way in which Christians have to give up their lifestyle of excesses and sins to live a simpler life. Either way, Eliot could be saying that no spirituality can be found without seeking far and wide and ploughing through adversity.

Change

Eliot also explores the way that spiritual experiences change you, with the Magi returning from the journey different people. When the Magi ‘returned to their places’ they found that they were ‘no longer at ease’ there, perhaps suggesting that their spiritual experience has changed them, and they are no longer who they were when they set out. The word ‘ease’ also suggests that now they feel apart from those around them, who they now see as an ‘alien people’. Eliot seems to be indicating that they are now foreigners in their homeland, and that the spiritual experience has marked them out as different from their compatriots, or alternatively that the people who didn’t go with them that do not fit in to this new world which has just dawned. In fact, Eliot even says the Magi would ‘be glad of another death’ which could refer to themselves.  This may indicate that spiritual experiences leave you so hungry for more and normal life seeming so futile that the only option after that is death, or that they were so depressed by their new knowledge and isolation that they wanted to die, or even that they want to join God in heaven. That they consider their countrymen’s gods to be ‘their’s’ not their own connotes that the Magi had undergone a significant spiritual change, and they not no longer have their pagan beliefs. With this Eliot could be saying that a true spiritual experience leaves you completely changed, whether for better or worse.

Conclusion

In both ‘The Second Coming’ and ‘Journey of the Magi’ spirituality is presented as quite destructive and not as rewarding as expected, however life-changing it is.