Author Type

Graduate Student

Date of Award

2009

Document Type

Thesis

Publication Status

Version of Record

Submission Date

October 2026

Abstract

This study is an examination of ocular imagery in the secular poetry of T.S. Eliot. As a symbol, eyes begin as a metonym for the panoptic vision of society. In the earliest poems, Michel Foucault's conceptions of discipline illuminate the acerbic paranoia attached to ocular imagery and its source in the culture of turn-of-the-century Boston. Towards 1919, the image of eyes becomes an objective correlative for the figure of Dante's Beatrice who represents both earthly and divine love. The loss of sight by the various speakers in both - "Gerontion" and The Waste Land is then the loss of connection to both the earthly woman and God. Finally, in The Hollow Men, the tenor and vehicle merge completely so the eyes themselves become the object of desire.

Extent

v, 81 p.

Comments

by Joshua RIchards.|Thesis (M.A.)--Florida Atlantic University, 2009.|Includes bibliography.|Electronic reproduction. Boca Raton, Fla., 2009. Mode of access: World Wide Web.|by Joshua RIchards.

Identifier

FADT215286

Format

pdf

Download

Share

COinS