The Nature Of Humanism In T. S. Eliot's The Hollow Man

T. S. Eliot composed “The Hollow Men” during the period of time when the world was recovering from World War I. This war “had been the most brutal and destructive in Western History” (Baym 1417). There were new mechanisms with which to wage war and kill one another which demonstrated that as the human race progressed scientifically, that humanity lost connection to the “traditional, humanistic explanations of the…world and the felt human life” (Baym 1076). Replacing that loss was a bleak belief that science held all the answers. Combined with the destructive nature of the war with the extreme belief in science, this led to a kind of fatalistic outlook to the direction that the world was moving. People acted like “mindless, callous machines, …show more content…
This is reflected in the in the first two epigraphs and supported throughout this section. First, there is a reference to Joseph Conrad’s The Heart of Darkness wherein it is stated that “Mistah Kurtz- he dead.” While the word ‘dead’ refers to a physical death, it can also denote being “destitute of spiritual life or energy” (“Dead, adj., n., adv,” def. I4). Kurtz, in the novel, was the shadowy reflection of the hero who was a cold, callous man and thus spiritually dead. As such, the speakers claim a kinship with Kurtz by claiming they “are the hollow men” (“Hollow” line 1). This suggests that the speakers are spiritually bereft which can be equated to the loss of their humanistic understanding. Their understanding was replaced and they now call themselves “the stuffed men” (“Hollow” line 2). This stuffing is knowledge that lacks a connection with the experience of life. It causes them to decay into meaningless routines which is why they are noticed “leaning together” (“Hollow” line 3). This meme is supported by the second epigraph which reads “a penny for the old guy” which refers to effigies created for Guy Fawkes Day (“Hollow”). Kinship is claimed by the speakers to these effigies in line four where it states their heads are “filled with straw” (“Hollow”). According to Stolarek, the straw symbolizes “absurd, nonsense ideas” which disables the speakers from acting in a …show more content…
Eliot’s “The Hollow Men,” describing through the utilization of terse, choppy sentences, a world breaking down. As the narrative unfolds, the reader is introduced to a world that is not only physically declining, but the shows that the mental state of its’ people are as well. Over the five sections, the narrators, a group of “hollow men” confess their fears and their worries demonstrating the deterioration of their mental state. These men are the representations of those have been taken “out of their more primitive environment” and lost “their humanity, their core, and their very reason for existence” (Thurmond). Since there is motivation for existence, have no inclination towards action to save themselves or others and fear the judgment that this attitude will bring upon them and so hide in “deliberate disguises” (Hollow). At the conclusion of this discourse, the speakers perform futile attempts towards redemption. Similarly, the number of the poems’ words lead to a sense of exhaustion. This poem uses over 420 words with only 180 words varying. This indicates that “the poem itself is entropic…gradually exhausting its store of words” (Ebury). The final quatrain contains the final set of repetitions found in the poem, three lines that read “This is the way the world ends” (“Hollow” line 97), and then both poem and the speaker’s chance at redemption end quietly and without a fight, ending “with a whimper” (“Hollow line