The Wasteland: Part Three

  The Fire Sermon starts out with the description of a river. The land is brown and unheard which indicates that nothing has lived on it for awhile. "The River bears no empty bottles, sandwich papers, Silk handkerchiefs, cardboard boxes, cigarette ends Or other testimony of summer nights." (Lines 5-7) Usually along the banks of a river, there is some sort of trash showing that someone was there. On these rivers banks there is nothing of that sort there, which is an sign that there is no life.

"The nymphs have departed." (Line 7) Nymphs are mythological female spirits that were associated with a particular landform or location. Naiads, were a type of nymph that preside over running water such as streams, springs, fountains, and rivers. Naiads were bound to their bodies of running water, so if the water were to dry up, the nymph would die. Even though the river in the poem hasn't dried up, everyone, human and animal alike, have stopped visiting the river banks; which has caused everything to die. When the speaker says the nymphs have departed it means that their 'souls' have died with the river. By the speaker only saying they are gone, knowing that nymphs die when the water dries up, and also knowing that the river still has water in it, you can infer that the nymphs have left the river in search of a river with life.

The river does however have elements of death. "A rat crept softly through the vegetation" (Line 15) Rats are disgusting creatures that eat dead, such as people or other animals. This rat connects to the previous section when the man says "I think we are in rats' alley Where the dead men lost their bones." Rats probably stole the bones. In this section there are dead bodies all over the shore of the river.

In the second stanza of this poem there are allusions to Marvell's To His Coy Mistress. In Marvell's poem there is man trying to seduce a woman. He doesn't love her and you can conclude that she doesn't love him either. This backs up the idea of love / the lack of love. There is also an allusion to the nightingale's song which backs up the same idea of lack of love.

The poem than states that Mr. Eugenides (the one-eyed merchant from the first section) hits on the merchant which backs up the idea of lack of love (lust). He invites him to lunch at the Cannon Street Hotel and then to a weekend at the Metropole.

The poem moves on to a scene in which we encounter Tiresias, a blind seer. Like the fortuneteller in the first section he tells of a scene that he has 'seen'. He tells about a woman sitting at home in a messy apartment. Her guest arrives and they have dinner. After dinner he can't take it anymore and essentially date rapes her. Though it sort of seems like she couldn't care either way. This also backs up the idea of lust instead of love and life in death.

There is also an allusion to Queen Elizabeth I and the Earl of Leicester. Elizabeth I and the Earl of Leicester supposedly had an affair, though the queen had to deny it because she was supposed to remain a virgin and reserve herself for the royalty of other nations. This supports the idea of lust instead of love.