Tradition and Individual Talent- T.S.Eliot

THE Tradition and individual talent is well known essay by T. S. Eliot. In which he gives definition of the tradition and also explain the individual talent. In the essay he explain the tradition as

1.       Tradition does not means that the close adherence to the literary tradition of the past. The tradition means-the past-and the literary tradition means the work of writer and their writing style. The every writer contributes his talent in the tradition. It is the tradition with which we compare our present writer and find newness in present work. It is simple that we come to know about the new because there is something that we call past.

2.     The historical sense means as Eliot presented in his essay. "The historical sense involves a perception, not only of the pastness of the past, but of its presence". In this quote he says that the historical sense involves ability of perceiving the pastness of the past and he also able to find the present of the past and how it works at present time. It means the poet is aware about the tradition of the past and he is also aware of the present tradition – in which pattern the writer of the past and the present has been writing.

“This historical sense, which is a sense of the timeless as well as of the temporal and of the timeless and of the temporal together, is what makes a writer traditional. In this quote I think that the historical sense of the writer means a sense of the timelessness of the subject matter for example the emotion of love, hate, etc. They are basic human nature and these are perpetual desires. And sometime the historical sense in the writer also involves that what is the test of the public at present time, like social, political and other contemporary issues by using which he write and try to make his work permanence and sometime writer makes use of both.

3.     The relationship between the tradition and the individual talent is interdependence. Both helps each other they are closely related. “In this essay the relation between tradition and individual talent both should get together as he says that “if you want to appreciate a poet you cannot value it alone you must set him for contrast and comparison among the dead-past. If we take tradition as a past and individual talent as present then the past is complete before the new work arrives and when new comes past readjust itself in order and this is the conformity between the old and new. In another the past is altered by the present as much as present is directed by the past.

4.        "Some can absorb knowledge, the more tardy must sweat for it. Shakespeare acquired more essential history from Plutarch than most men could from the whole British Museum". In this quote Eliot explain that to be a good poet one must have the common sense. It is not necessary for a poet to read all the literary history of the past but one has to have understanding of human nature. Like the Shakespeare who is not a university student or very educated fellow, but he easily understood everything which the university wits and his contemporary could not. In our Gujarati and Hindi literature there are examples like Narsinh Maheta, Meera, Kabir etc. who never went to school.

5.       "Honest criticism and sensitive appreciation is directed not upon the poet but upon the poetry" In this line he tried to explain that the honest criticism and the appreciation by any critic is of the work art and not of the writer. If we like any work of art it is the quality of that work we like, not the poet’s personality. The problems arise from that misunderstanding (liking the personality of the poet) and after that what happens is that the ideal image that we have conceived in our mind is broken when we come to know about the personal life of that poet.

6.       The theory of depersonalization is becomes very simple with the help of the example of chemical reaction. And I also like to apply the same. In the second part of the essay he gives an example of the chemical reaction to explain his theory, the chemical process seems to very similar to that of the poetry. If we compare the chemical elements with the poet’s body.

So3 – Sulpher dioxide = poet’s feelings and emotions

O2 – oxygen = poet’s experience and imaginations

Platinum - = poet’s mind

H2SO4 – sulfuric acid = poetry

Here in this the chemical process is only possible in the presence of the platinum, without it cannot be possible. Though platinum plays vital role in the process, but it is not found in the product itself. The same is in the poetic process in which the mind of the poet plays vital role in creating poetry. Mere feelings and emotions cannot make the poem. And same like platinum poets mind does not reflect in poetry.

7.       " Poetry is not a turning loose of emotion, but an escape from emotion; it is not the expression of personality, but an escape from personality."  In this quote Eliot assert that the poet is not to find a new emotions, but use ordinary one and in working upon them in to poetry, to express feelings which are not in actual emotions at all. And emotions which he never experienced will serve his turn as well as those familiar to him. So the above quote is true