In his book about “Tradition” Edward Shils claims, “there are two pasts.” One is the phenomenal past; the past of realism, the past of occurred incidents which builds a sequence of human action until the present is reached.
The other past is the perceived past. As “a much more plastic thing” this form of past is recorded in myths, memory and in literature, which are built up on the encounters and experiences with the occurred incidents.
Sethe, the fictional figure and protagonist in Toni Morrison’s “Beloved”, offers a view towards the timelessness and power of memory: “If a house burns down, it’s gone, but the place – the picture of it – stays, and not just in my rememory, but out there, in the world.” Does that mean that memories live amongst us? Of course many things we remember today have been there long before our generation was born – for example experiences of our ancestors during World War II, or even myth, traditional orals. Nevertheless, its appearances before do change in the mind of the living generation which is referring to it.
Concerning a pedagogical purpose, in his book, Shils claims for a need of tradition as T.S Eliot does in his essay “Tradition and the Individual Talent”. With a sensitive regard to the past as function and feeder for a modern artist, it becomes obvious that even novelty presupposes what T.S. Eliot calls “historical sense”. In his essay from 1919 Eliot debates about the problem of time and its relation towards the past. In Eliot’s understanding
“[…] the historical sense involves a perception, not only of the pastness of the past, but of its presence; […] This historical sense, which is a sense of the timeless as well as of the temporal and of the timeless and the temporal together, is what makes a writer traditional.”
Table of Contents
1 Introduction
2 T.S. Eliot, “The Waste Land” and the past
2.1 T.S. Eliot towards the aesthetics of memory
2.2 Rhetoric of memory in “The Waste Land”
2.3 Does “The Waste Land” correspond with Eliot’s view towards memory?
3 Toni Morrison, “Beloved” and the past
3.1 Toni Morrison towards the aesthetics of memory
3.2 Rhetoric of memory in “Beloved”
3.3 Does “Beloved” correlate with Morrison’s view towards memory?
4 Conclusion
Research Objective and Key Themes
This paper examines the concept of memory in T.S. Eliot’s poem "The Waste Land" and Toni Morrison’s novel "Beloved," exploring how both authors use literature to mediate the past and address historical trauma. The study investigates the reciprocity between personal experience, collective cultural memory, and the "hard facts" of history, ultimately analyzing how both authors deploy language and narrative structure to facilitate healing and identity formation.
- The dualistic nature of the past: phenomenal versus perceived.
- The aesthetic and rhetorical techniques used to represent memory.
- The function of literature as a tool for "rememory" and communal healing.
- The relationship between literary tradition, myth, and personal identity.
- The psychoanalytic and moral dimensions of confronting historical trauma.
Excerpt from the Book
3 Toni Morrison, “Beloved” and the past
Let me return to Edward Shils and his dualism of the phenomenal past, which is the past of realism, of occurred incidents and the perceived past as the form of past which builds communal myth, memory and literature up on the occurred events. Toni Morrison establishes in “Beloved” a new category to the qualities of the perceived past – the vision, as an imagination of a recovery process of healing the terror and horror of the occurred and experienced slavery past.
Moreover, the author arranges a dialectic to expand the African American voice between the phenomenal past, the horror of slavery and the perceived past that maintains the possibility of regeneration as Sethe, an ex-slave woman, is haunted by the ghost of her baby, she had killed to safe her from the repression of slavery. This physical confrontation with her personal past is a process in which Sethe rememorizes the wounds and the emotions to reformulate her identity.
The term of rememory Morrison establishes in her novel, reveals Sethe’s chamber of traumatic memory and experience that consists of “uncontrolled remembering and reliving of emotionally painful experiences”. The lost guilt of the murder becomes perceivable as the baby ghost appears as a visual image of Sethe’s memory. This vividness of a tragic and painful past she explains to her daughter, Denver. A purity of memory as a living relation to the past becomes aware.
Summary of Chapters
1 Introduction: This chapter introduces the duality of the past—phenomenal and perceived—and sets the scope for analyzing memory in Eliot’s and Morrison’s works.
2 T.S. Eliot, “The Waste Land” and the past: The chapter explores how Eliot utilizes fragmented references and myth to deconstruct modern consciousness and advocate for a new tradition.
2.1 T.S. Eliot towards the aesthetics of memory: This section discusses Eliot’s critical ideals and his belief in the poet's role as a mediator between cultural memory and personal experience.
2.2 Rhetoric of memory in “The Waste Land”: This section analyzes the complex, antithetical structure of the poem and the use of allusion to signal decay and potential rebirth.
2.3 Does “The Waste Land” correspond with Eliot’s view towards memory?: This section links the poem’s structure back to Eliot’s essay "Tradition and the Individual Talent," confirming the intentionality of his "multi-voiced dialectic."
3 Toni Morrison, “Beloved” and the past: The chapter examines how Morrison uses the narrative of slavery to create a "history of the present" through the lens of collective trauma.
3.1 Toni Morrison towards the aesthetics of memory: This section defines Morrison’s concept of "rememory" and its function as an imaginative act to access the unwritten "interior life" of the enslaved.
3.2 Rhetoric of memory in “Beloved”: This section focuses on the use of symbolism, the grotesque, and anaphora to represent the hauntings of history.
3.3 Does “Beloved” correlate with Morrison’s view towards memory?: This section concludes that the novel successfully brings the "unsaid" history of slavery into a tangible, healing dialogue.
4 Conclusion: The concluding chapter summarizes the shared moral and aesthetic aims of both authors in using literature to reanimate the past for a more matured future.
Keywords
Memory, Rememory, T.S. Eliot, Toni Morrison, The Waste Land, Beloved, Slavery, Cultural Memory, Myth, Tradition, Trauma, Identity, Literature, Modernism, Historical Sense.
Frequently Asked Questions
What is the primary focus of this paper?
The paper explores how memory is conceptualized and represented in T.S. Eliot’s "The Waste Land" and Toni Morrison’s "Beloved," specifically looking at how both authors use literary techniques to bridge the gap between the past and the present.
What are the central themes discussed?
Key themes include the distinction between the phenomenal and perceived past, the role of myth in literature, the psychological healing process through memory, and the preservation of African American history.
What is the core research objective?
The objective is to demonstrate that both Eliot and Morrison, despite their different contexts, use destructive literary methods to confront their characters and readers with suppressed memories in order to achieve cultural or personal renewal.
Which scientific methods are employed?
The author uses a comparative literary approach, analyzing essays, theoretical works (such as those by Edward Shils and Jan Assmann), and the primary literary texts themselves to identify patterns in how memory is constructed and voiced.
What does the main body of the work address?
The main body examines Eliot’s "multi-voiced" use of allusion and his "historical sense," followed by an analysis of Morrison’s concept of "rememory" and how she gives voice to the traumatic history of slavery.
What distinguishes the keywords of this work?
The keywords highlight the intersection of literary analysis and the philosophy of memory, centering on technical terms like "rememory" and broader historical concepts like "trauma" and "slavery."
How does T.S. Eliot use myth in "The Waste Land"?
Eliot uses myth not as a moral instruction, but as a "rhetoric time capsule." He isolates motifs from their original context to create an artificial, fragmented space that challenges the reader to reconstruct meaning.
What does Toni Morrison mean by the term "rememory"?
For Morrison, "rememory" refers to the concept that memories exist as external entities—places and images that float in the world—which one can encounter or accidentally enter, representing the inescapable nature of traumatic history.
- Quote paper
- Sebastian Polmans (Author), 2007, The Present of the Past - Drafts of Memory in T.S. Eliot's "The Waste Land" and Toni Morrison's "Beloved", Munich, GRIN Verlag, https://www.grin.com/document/84375
