The Waste Land (TS Eliot) read by Alec Guinness

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  • Опубліковано 1 жов 2024
  • TS Eliot's The Waste Land read by Alec Guinness. Timings for the segments:
    0:06 I. The Burial of the Dead
    4:54 II. A Game of Chess
    10:11 III. The Fire Sermon
    17:33 IV. Death by Water
    18:10 V. What the Thunder Said
    (thanks to Phillip Brandel). You can't buy this anywhere - big love to Ludifex for making it a free download at / alec-guinness-the-wast...

КОМЕНТАРІ • 471

  • @violetsweet1660
    @violetsweet1660 5 років тому +428

    i wonder how much damage critics have done to this poem by being so insistent about its difficulty. i'm convinced that if you just listen, you will find something. this is a poem of incredible warmth and deep sorrow, and those come across so wonderfully in this reading. you don't have to know who tiresias is; just listen to the nightingale and her inviolable voice.

    • @rachelwoods2279
      @rachelwoods2279 4 роки тому +38

      Eliot himself stated that it was far easier to understand a poem without any guidelines to what you should be understanding.

    • @DimWeasel
      @DimWeasel 4 роки тому +18

      At the violet hour, when the eyes and back
      Turn upward from the desk, when the human engine waits
      Like a taxi throbbing waiting,
      I Tiresias, though blind, throbbing between two lives,
      Old man with wrinkled female breasts, can see
      At the violet hour, the evening hour that strives
      Homeward, and brings the sailor home from sea

    • @chavrossavros
      @chavrossavros 2 роки тому +12

      It’s a poem to be read aloud and performed, not to be read silently

    • @halfstep44
      @halfstep44 Рік тому +3

      "Presents significant challenges to the reader" blah blah blah.....I know I've heard them all. You may as well tell people that "this is going to be torture"

    • @kannadable
      @kannadable Рік тому +4

      There are as many versions of the poem as those who choose to struggle with it. I guess we need to do ourselves a favor when we read it or cannot help thinking about it since it just won't leave us alone. Forget what Eliot, Pound, or anybody else has said about it. All lasting works of art carry with them the burden of anecdotage.

  • @toriidawdy8456
    @toriidawdy8456 2 роки тому +89

    I have spent 50 years with this poem. Trying to memorize it and amazed at my "new" favorite part. "The Golden Bough " revieled itself and The Upishandis ripped open a bottomless rabbit hole. I learned german and why there is always more than expected on this trek. It wants you to know . Its has no secrets. The thin volume fits great in back pocket of my work pants

    • @comraderaoul
      @comraderaoul 8 місяців тому +4

      This is my favorite comment I've ever read on youtube.

    • @philliphutson7903
      @philliphutson7903 3 місяці тому

      beautiful comment

  • @speckle910
    @speckle910 Рік тому +45

    What a wonderful interpretation by the late Sir Alec Guinness! In my view it is far superior to Eliot's own reading. At the age of 82 I am a latecomer to Eliot, and to poetry generally and whilst I don't profess to understand everything in what is generally accepted as a difficult poem to get to grips with, this reading certainly helped.

  • @eyesofthelaw
    @eyesofthelaw 4 роки тому +245

    April is the cruelest month.... enjoying this under COVID lockdown

  • @stvtron
    @stvtron 7 років тому +150

    1:43 - And I will show you something different from either
    Your shadow at morning striding behind you
    Or your shadow at evening rising to meet you;
    I will show you fear in a handful of dust.

    • @hannahzwic5975
      @hannahzwic5975 6 років тому +5

      stvtron that scared me

    • @joanduthie1689
      @joanduthie1689 4 роки тому +6

      I can’t help but think of Steven King when I read this part. I love the little bits of poetry he puts in before the beginning of each of the Dark Tower books.

    • @nickpolycandriotes1484
      @nickpolycandriotes1484 4 роки тому

      @guth Any language. These lyrics are......(sorry I can't find the words).

    • @Beantbeantbeant
      @Beantbeantbeant 2 роки тому +1

      Reminds me of DC comics "Sandman" By Neil Gaiman, "I Will show you fear in a handful of dust" was the tagline for the marketing

    • @finger420
      @finger420 Рік тому

      Uncharted 3

  • @phillipbrandel7932
    @phillipbrandel7932 5 років тому +129

    0:06 I. The Burial of the Dead
    4:54 II. A Game of Chess
    10:11 III. The Fire Sermon
    17:33 IV. Death by Water
    18:10 V. What the Thunder Said

  • @adamkossoff7377
    @adamkossoff7377 2 роки тому +34

    ‘These fragments I have shored against my ruins.’ His ruins, the ruins of his passing life, the ruins of his country...

  • @abhishek-euphony-and-euphoria
    @abhishek-euphony-and-euphoria Рік тому +51

    Nobody talked about sir alec guiness…such superb performance, bring the poem to life

    • @chopin65
      @chopin65 Рік тому +3

      I agree.

    • @saragautham
      @saragautham 11 місяців тому

      Obi Wan Kenobi!

    • @davidtyndall3786
      @davidtyndall3786 3 місяці тому

      Bravo abravi . ODB be bmasyinh itinerary kingdo. !!!!

    • @davidtyndall3786
      @davidtyndall3786 3 місяці тому

      Beavis said. Huhhuh. Koool!!!@

    • @davidtyndall3786
      @davidtyndall3786 3 місяці тому

      And then We needed teepee for our bungholes . Teepee.
      - Col. holio

  • @thefisherking78
    @thefisherking78 2 роки тому +15

    I have yet to find a bigger Eliot fan than myself, and as far as I'm concerned he reads it better than TSE did.

    • @Idmoment
      @Idmoment 2 роки тому +1

      Well- I am obsessed w his poetry. Absolutely the MASTER. Did you know when Eliot worked in editing at Faber he published WH Auden first poems ?
      He spotted his greatness immediately.

    • @thefisherking78
      @thefisherking78 Рік тому

      @@Idmoment i did not!!

  • @clairejones1063
    @clairejones1063 4 роки тому +33

    If you like this, make sure you read Four Quartets as well. His poetry is simply beautiful and captivating Xxx

  • @Hawkwood96
    @Hawkwood96 Рік тому +22

    I wrote my undergrad capstone and my graduate thesis on The Waste Land, and I'm still gleaning new tidbits every fifth listen/read-through.

  • @TheMimifur
    @TheMimifur 7 років тому +309

    Utter bliss. The poem and the reader. This in my view is the definitive recording of The Waste Land. I prefer it to Eliot's own reading. And it's not such a hard understand. It's just about life. Thank you so much for putting this up here.

    • @irenemax3574
      @irenemax3574 5 років тому +1

      Ditto!

    • @nickjohnson8495
      @nickjohnson8495 4 роки тому +8

      Saying it’s just about life is not true and utterly belittling. “Life” has nothing to do with it

    • @skatingcrowproductions2301
      @skatingcrowproductions2301 4 роки тому +1

      "Life" has less to do with it than death... or maybe more aptly put it has to do with what are now ghostly cues toward clues to reveal dark secrets. Check out this video on what T.S. Eliot has to do with the Zodiac Killer. ua-cam.com/video/ncgaUEeHQPQ/v-deo.html

    • @NaSamymDnie16400
      @NaSamymDnie16400 4 роки тому +4

      >I read much of the night and go south in the winter
      WTF I love T.S. Eliot now

    • @clairejones1063
      @clairejones1063 4 роки тому +2

      I agree, it’s utterly brilliant!! Never get tired of reading or indeed listening to it. The fire sermon is my favourite, takes me somewhere not known to man, simply beautiful Xxx

  • @sleepylucia9335
    @sleepylucia9335 Рік тому +16

    i'm so happy to have found this! "the waste land" is such a beautiful, personal poem and guinness does a masterful job in conveying all those themes of sorrow and loss and life in his reading of it.

  • @TheCarbunkleofTruth
    @TheCarbunkleofTruth 11 місяців тому +3

    These are not the dried tubers you are looking for ✋️

  • @TomorrowWeLive
    @TomorrowWeLive 5 років тому +81

    When I first read this poem as a teen, I didn't get it. It did nothing for me. Now, after revisiting it several times over the years, and with the help of performances like this and Fiona Shaw's, I think I get it, or at least bits of it. Poetry is one of those things that does grow on you, and with Eliot, especially, there are always more shades of meaning to be found.

    • @spacemunky53
      @spacemunky53 4 роки тому +6

      Shades of meanings found thanx to ezra pound.

    • @holograMMarXIV
      @holograMMarXIV 4 роки тому +1

      Oh keep the Dog far hence, that’s friend to men,
      Or with his nails he’ll dig it up again!

    • @TomorrowWeLive
      @TomorrowWeLive 4 роки тому +3

      @@spacemunky53 I like Ezra Pound's commentary/criticism. Unfortunately can't abide his poetry though.

    • @bonnie_gail
      @bonnie_gail 4 роки тому

      Tomorrow We Live snapshots of life that fully engage one life at a time

    • @toriidawdy8456
      @toriidawdy8456 2 роки тому +2

      This classic is wonderfully footnoted . Great themes are dog eared and are lyrics themselves. They offer little understanding but another layer of uberelliot

  • @docbones213
    @docbones213 3 роки тому +6

    Of course I know him. He's me.

  • @justins7796
    @justins7796 6 років тому +166

    I had to swing by this video in case my depression went away.

    • @mrJohnDesiderio
      @mrJohnDesiderio 6 років тому +4

      Keep watching Tucker and you’ll witness “The Wasteland” of thought.

    • @gregoropesa5028
      @gregoropesa5028 6 років тому +1

      John Desiderio hmm. My Lit teacher quoted you today

    • @Niovo
      @Niovo 4 роки тому

      big mood

    • @williamnordwall787
      @williamnordwall787 4 роки тому

      @@Niovo Hej Anirudh

    • @Niovo
      @Niovo 4 роки тому

      @@williamnordwall787 hej william hahah

  • @PictureDorianPiana
    @PictureDorianPiana 4 роки тому +21

    >Who is the third who walks always beside you?
    >When I count, there are only you and I together
    >But when I look ahead up the white road
    >There is always another one walking beside you
    Matthew 18:20 “For where two or three are gathered together in my name, there am I in the midst of them”

    • @markhughes7927
      @markhughes7927 6 місяців тому +1

      Was thinking as I listened to that part of the road to Emaus - yours seems the closer reference - but then perhaps Matthew’s is an elaboration of that singular journey. The portrait of the dry rocks without water reminds of the Exodus experience where Moses momentarily loses faith - is that the intended allusion do you think?

    • @davidtyndall3786
      @davidtyndall3786 3 місяці тому

      Bravo good citizen ! Bravo

    • @davidtyndall3786
      @davidtyndall3786 3 місяці тому

      Possibly Creator, destroyer and I. Or the 3 sisters. Life fate and death. Just a thought from a 7 th grade flunkie

    • @davidtyndall3786
      @davidtyndall3786 3 місяці тому

      Goes great with misses riding hood. The girl grew up to runnith with 🐺 🦊 🐺 🦊 🐺 🦊 🐺

    • @glenncambray9783
      @glenncambray9783 3 місяці тому +1

      No need for biblical sources here. I believe this comes from Eliot's reading of Ernest Shakleton.

  • @gregcugola779
    @gregcugola779 2 роки тому +4

    Far too may words.
    Like any good sauce,
    Condense Eliot into a word,
    Not a sentence.
    A paragraph,
    Nor a tome.
    There’s a whisper down the field where the year has shot her yield,
    And the ricks stand grey to the sun,
    Singing: ‘Over then, come over, for the bee has quit the clover,
    ‘And your English summer's done.’
    Kipling nails it.

  • @c.s.hayden3022
    @c.s.hayden3022 2 роки тому +9

    The real kick in the balls is he was thirty-four when he wrote this. At least we know what can happen when natural talent, great influences and timing work together. You could shoot for this level of quality and still miss beautifully. New voices for new times.

  • @derasor
    @derasor 4 роки тому +14

    "Phlebas the Phoenician, a fortnight dead,
    Forgot the cry of gulls, and the deep sea swell
    And the profit and loss.
    A current undersea
    Picked his bones in whispers. As he rose and fell
    He passed the stages of his age and youth
    Entering the whirlpool.
    Gentile or Jew
    O you who turn the wheel and look to windward,
    Consider Phlebas, who was once handsome and tall as you."
    22:28
    "The awful daring of a moment's surrender
    Which an age of prudence can never retract"

    • @ManichaeanMannequin
      @ManichaeanMannequin 3 роки тому +1

      en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Consider_Phlebas

    • @irenejohnston6802
      @irenejohnston6802 3 роки тому +3

      I live with that, impulsive innocence/stupidity, 1958. This is how I read it. The awful daring of a moment's surrender which an age of prudence cannot retract. 81 yrs of age

    • @derasor
      @derasor 3 роки тому +1

      @@irenejohnston6802 like some wise Viking said; No regrets, and every single regret. Cheers!

  • @davey2363
    @davey2363 2 роки тому +6

    First class. A masterclass in spoken English.

  • @georgeparkins777
    @georgeparkins777 4 роки тому +19

    He do the characters in different voices!

  • @TomorrowWeLive
    @TomorrowWeLive 7 років тому +28

    I never used to like this poem, but it's grown on me. Particular moments are extremely evocative.

    • @willb3698
      @willb3698 7 років тому +4

      Tomorrow We Live - Yes: Helps to have it read so well.

    • @Rainbow_Quartz
      @Rainbow_Quartz 7 років тому +1

      I was so confused and wasn't even sure I liked, it got worse and worse with the first two parts but then it started to get better and more awesome and a little more clearer, than I got to What The Thunder Said and that was just awesome and so beautifully surreal.

  • @andrewdavidpomeroy2922
    @andrewdavidpomeroy2922 7 років тому +94

    This is an otherwise magical reading, but his German accent does sound a bit like Dracula...

    • @jamesdolan4042
      @jamesdolan4042 4 роки тому +13

      German accent? He is not German. In actual fact, he is probably among the great English actors of a generation that included Lawerence Olivia (English), Richard Burton (Welsh), Peter O Tool (ex Pat), etc.

    • @FlyingTeacup
      @FlyingTeacup 4 роки тому +1

      You mean a Saxon accent? Yea very Nordic. 🙈

    • @gageamonette5120
      @gageamonette5120 4 роки тому +9

      @@jamesdolan4042 He's referring to the German language portion of the poem.

    • @jamesdolan4042
      @jamesdolan4042 4 роки тому +1

      @@gageamonette5120 And what is the German language part of the poem? Let me know, and thanks.

    • @gageamonette5120
      @gageamonette5120 4 роки тому +4

      @@jamesdolan4042 Bin gar keine Russin, stamm’ aus Litauen, echt deutsch.
      and
      Frisch weht der Wind
      Der Heimat zu
      Mein Irisch Kind,
      Wo weilest du?
      and
      Oed’ und leer das Meer.
      That's all the German in the poem as far as I know.

  • @onthetrail506
    @onthetrail506 5 років тому +10

    By the waters of Leman I sat down and wept . . .
    Sweet Thames, run softly till I end my song,
    Sweet Thames, run softly, for I speak not loud or long.
    But at my back in a cold blast I hear
    The rattle of the bones, and chuckle spread from ear to ear.

  • @christophervanasse9911
    @christophervanasse9911 2 роки тому +22

    The way this starts,
    “April is the cruelest month”
    always made me so confused when I was younger. How could someone in their twenties juxtapose the revitalization of spring with winter hiding a wasteland of damage. I don’t pretend to understand most of this poem, but I’m starting to see fragments of clarity.

  • @MatDale
    @MatDale 3 роки тому +13

    " I will show you fear in a handful of dust." This line was first brought to my attention in Stephen King's, "The Dark Tower" series. The same line being in Neil Gaiman's, "The Sandman" only solidified my necessity to seek out the original source of this material, and I am thoroughly pleased with it.

    • @samharness24271
      @samharness24271 3 роки тому +3

      Long days and pleasant nights.

    • @jassingh8215
      @jassingh8215 2 роки тому +1

      The Scarecrow from Batman also references that line, so it's rather popular in media it seems

    • @MatDale
      @MatDale 2 роки тому +3

      @@samharness24271 may you have twice the number

  • @finnbarsnowdrop545
    @finnbarsnowdrop545 7 років тому +71

    Quality. Absolutely top drawer. Found a copy of this in perfect nick in a London skip along with some Dylan Thomas, Ralph Richardson readings and the Burton Under Milkwood. Beautiful recording on the vinyl although this upload is a bit boomy. A good lesson for actors in how to read poetry; it's a different kind of use of the voice from stagework - it's about carving and polishing the words out of the air and making as much use of silence and sustain as an instrumentalist.

    • @caroltaylor3414
      @caroltaylor3414 6 років тому +7

      I'm going to memorize that phrase "it's about carving and polishing the words out of the air". Gorgeous description of this reading.

    • @irenemax3574
      @irenemax3574 5 років тому +3

      Finnbar Snowdrop Man, those are treasures! I can’t help feeling disappointed that the Waste Land was in perfect nick: somebody had it in their collection but never listened to it.

  • @johnsing1833
    @johnsing1833 5 місяців тому +2

    wonderful.. , amazing reading by Alec Guinness

  • @WyrdTajls
    @WyrdTajls 3 роки тому +4

    I who have sat by Thebes below the wall.
    And walked among the lowest of the dead.

  • @DM-nh3wd
    @DM-nh3wd 8 років тому +26

    A wonderful treat - cannot believe this only has a few thousand views.

    • @TheMimifur
      @TheMimifur 7 років тому +3

      You'll see far more views now. Poss early low number cos many like me had given up searching for several years. I first heard this reading on BBC Radio Three several decades ago. When youtube arrived, I searched avidly but it wasn't there. Eliot's own reading has been available for years, but quite frankly, it is dull!! As so often the case with poets reading their own work. It's just a joy that we have this now and thank you so much to modelsandjuniors for giving this back to me. Oh and in the original broadcast, Guiness reads Prufrock first, then Sir Stephen Spender talks a bit about the poems. That would be a lovely thing to hear.

    • @nyar369
      @nyar369 6 років тому

      It seems all of the beautiful things in this world will only get a few thousand views, my friend. :(

    • @TopCutsAudio
      @TopCutsAudio 4 роки тому

      now it has over 200,000 views

  • @etowahman1
    @etowahman1 7 років тому +32

    Beautiful words read with exquisite beauty and grace by a consummate professional.

  • @jman7826
    @jman7826 Рік тому +2

    Imagine a reading of the couple’s conversation in “a game of chess” read by Frank and Estelle Costanza at their most exasperated

  • @ahmedsalah2359
    @ahmedsalah2359 4 роки тому +20

    Unreal City,
    Under the brown fog of a winter dawn,
    A crowd flowed over London Bridge, so many,
    I had not thought death had undone so many.

    • @rosalindbaxter36
      @rosalindbaxter36 4 роки тому +1

      Game of Chess - this poem predicts the future, as the boredom of the idle rich in wartime (quarantine)

    • @bonnie_gail
      @bonnie_gail 4 роки тому

      Ahmed Salah mind blown

  • @BlimaWormtong
    @BlimaWormtong 4 роки тому +2

    Madame Sosostris, famous clairvoyante,
    Had a bad cold, nevertheless
    Is known to be the wisest woman in Europe,
    With a wicked pack of cards

  • @thefisherking78
    @thefisherking78 Рік тому +2

    How many times did I listen to this before I realized he says "schled" at 0:55? 😂😂😂

  • @jennyr4057
    @jennyr4057 5 років тому +12

    this is downright ASMR

    • @AikiDoge
      @AikiDoge 3 роки тому

      Musing upon the king my brother’s wreck
      And on the king my father’s death before him.

  • @sandiarnp
    @sandiarnp 3 роки тому +23

    Eliots words evoke intense emotion because he suffered terribly in his life. In his poetry is his gift of sharing his grief and his joy. The four quartets are a lifetime of reading and contemplating in and of themselves. How I wish I could have met him.

  • @amicidialfio3947
    @amicidialfio3947 3 роки тому +8

    April is the cruellest month, breeding
    Lilacs out of the dead land, mixing
    Memory and desire, stirring
    Dull roots with spring rain.
    Winter kept us warm, covering
    Earth in forgetful snow, feeding
    A little life with dried tubers.
    Summer surprised us, coming over the Starnbergersee
    With a shower of rain; we stopped in the colonnade,
    And went on in sunlight, into the Hofgarten,
    And drank coffee, and talked for an hour.
    Bin gar keine Russin, stamm’ aus Litauen, echt deutsch.
    And when we were children, staying at the arch-duke’s,
    My cousin’s, he took me out on a sled,
    And I was frightened. He said, Marie,
    Marie, hold on tight. And down we went.
    In the mountains, there you feel free.
    I read, much of the night, and go south in the winter.
    What are the roots that clutch, what branches grow
    Out of this stony rubbish? Son of man,
    You cannot say, or guess, for you know only
    A heap of broken images, where the sun beats,
    And the dead tree gives no shelter, the cricket no relief,
    And the dry stone no sound of water. Only
    There is shadow under this red rock,
    (Come in under the shadow of this red rock),
    And I will show you something different from either
    Your shadow at morning striding behind you
    Or your shadow at evening rising to meet you;
    I will show you fear in a handful of dust.
    Frisch weht der Wind
    Der Heimat zu
    Mein Irisch Kind,
    Wo weilest du?
    “You gave me hyacinths first a year ago;
    “They called me the hyacinth girl.”
    -Yet when we came back, late, from the Hyacinth garden,
    Your arms full, and your hair wet, I could not
    Speak, and my eyes failed, I was neither
    Living nor dead, and I knew nothing,
    Looking into the heart of light, the silence.
    Oed’ und leer das Meer.
    Madame Sosostris, famous clairvoyante,
    Had a bad cold, nevertheless
    Is known to be the wisest woman in Europe,
    With a wicked pack of cards. Here, said she,
    Is your card, the drowned Phoenician Sailor,
    (Those are pearls that were his eyes. Look!)
    Here is Belladonna, the Lady of the Rocks,
    The lady of situations.
    Here is the man with three staves, and here the Wheel,
    And here is the one-eyed merchant, and this card,
    Which is blank, is something he carries on his back,
    Which I am forbidden to see. I do not find
    The Hanged Man. Fear death by water.
    I see crowds of people, walking round in a ring.
    Thank you. If you see dear Mrs. Equitone,
    Tell her I bring the horoscope myself:
    One must be so careful these days.
    Unreal City,
    Under the brown fog of a winter dawn,
    A crowd flowed over London Bridge, so many,
    I had not thought death had undone so many.
    Sighs, short and infrequent, were exhaled,
    And each man fixed his eyes before his feet.
    Flowed up the hill and down King William Street,
    To where Saint Mary Woolnoth kept the hours
    With a dead sound on the final stroke of nine.
    There I saw one I knew, and stopped him, crying: “Stetson!
    “You who were with me in the ships at Mylae!
    “That corpse you planted last year in your garden,
    “Has it begun to sprout? Will it bloom this year?
    “Or has the sudden frost disturbed its bed?
    “Oh keep the Dog far hence, that’s friend to men,
    “Or with his nails he’ll dig it up again!
    “You! hypocrite lecteur!-mon semblable,-mon frère!”

  • @jarrodlacy9856
    @jarrodlacy9856 8 років тому +11

    Thank you for this incredible treat.

  • @johnparinellojr.2035
    @johnparinellojr.2035 3 роки тому +7

    This is absolute magic it's going to be really hard to play chess with this playing.

  • @martinhasson4942
    @martinhasson4942 5 років тому +4

    GUINNESS GIVES YOU STRENGTH!
    The " velvet voice " of a great knight in
    harmony to the singular inner voice
    of " the man ".........T S Eliot
    📃 📝📖📄📓📕🖍🖋🖊

  • @BourgeoisQueen
    @BourgeoisQueen 3 роки тому +6

    “This music crept by me upon the waters.”

  • @1968KWT
    @1968KWT 2 роки тому +11

    The poem was published exactly 100 years ago in the October issue of _The Criterion_ #TheWasteLand100

  • @iqrasalim134
    @iqrasalim134 3 роки тому +6

    So grateful for this upload ✨❤️💕

  • @MarlaMagdalenaXIX
    @MarlaMagdalenaXIX 4 роки тому +1

    Goonight Bill. Goonight Lou. Goonight May. Goonight.
    Ta ta. Goonight. Goonight.
    Good night, ladies, good night, sweet ladies, good night, good night.

  • @louisew5795
    @louisew5795 3 роки тому +4

    Love the start to Thunder, how his voice changes. lost, out of place, desperate feeling, no water, dry, otherworldly. Me and my husband have also been discussing the 'da' s. I still feel the da is loud and the dhatata (etc) is like a rumble after, an echo....my husband has always read the da and dhatata (etc) as all loud, like an interruption

  • @DazeOfOurLies
    @DazeOfOurLies 4 роки тому +1

    I do not find The Hanged Man
    Fear death by water

  • @itsjuno4467
    @itsjuno4467 10 місяців тому +1

    interesting how alec's various character voices betray his particular interpretations of when exactly the speaker changes throughout the poem, which isn't always made obvious by the text. like how in the first stanza he switches from his default english accent to a mock-german one only once he gets to "summer surprised us..."

  • @MusselsFromBrussels15
    @MusselsFromBrussels15 3 роки тому +2

    The chemist said it would be all right, but I’ve never been the same

  • @cliffordbernard7663
    @cliffordbernard7663 Рік тому +3

    A passionate cry against absence of passion

  • @JetLagRecords
    @JetLagRecords Місяць тому

    modelsandjuniors, Your videos always make me happy, so I subscribed!

  • @radhekrishnavrindavanam8077
    @radhekrishnavrindavanam8077 4 роки тому +5

    Awesome rendering. Took me through the life of the lines. The journey around the world in 24 minutes.Thank you.

    • @DazeOfOurLies
      @DazeOfOurLies 4 роки тому

      I do not find The Hanged Man
      Fear death by water

  • @mortalclown3812
    @mortalclown3812 2 місяці тому +1

    Love the opening thumbnail of Sir Alec behind an imposing pocketbook.
    Might be time to rewatch his turn as George Smylie.
    Rest in paradise.

  • @CowyGriffon
    @CowyGriffon 4 роки тому +1

    April is the cruellest month

  • @DimWeasel
    @DimWeasel 4 роки тому +3

    At the violet hour, when the eyes and back
    Turn upward from the desk, when the human engine waits
    Like a taxi throbbing waiting,
    I Tiresias, though blind, throbbing between two lives,
    Old man with wrinkled female breasts, can see
    At the violet hour, the evening hour that strives
    Homeward, and brings the sailor home from sea

  • @HondurasEndurance
    @HondurasEndurance 3 роки тому +2

    O the moon shone bright on Mrs. Porter.
    And on her daughter.
    They wash their feet in soda water.

  • @justanotherpoet2542
    @justanotherpoet2542 5 років тому +3

    To say this is a beautiful reading does not convey what beautiful encapsulates when so much of lesser beauty occupies the same. This is exquisite. Alec Guinness has brought Eliot alive like Richard Burton brings alive Dylan Thomas in his UA-cam uploaded recordings. Thank you so much for sharing.

    • @spacemunky53
      @spacemunky53 4 роки тому

      No one would of beeeleaved din din dinnnnn

  • @elliottcoffman6389
    @elliottcoffman6389 5 років тому +6

    I love this poem, and wrote my senior capstone on it. So much of this has to do with death and rebirth, from the references to many vegetation gods, to the rise and fall of great cities, to the references to the Golden Bough and the Fisher King. Too much for one comment to contain, but every time I listen to this or read it I always wind up unpacking a little bit more. Truly a masterpiece, even if its meaning remains elusive to the average reader.

    • @spacemunky53
      @spacemunky53 4 роки тому

      A masterpiece of pretentious shite christ poor ezra had his work cut out mentoring this prick...thank god for eustace mullins!!

    • @hamstergirl-ii7su
      @hamstergirl-ii7su 3 роки тому

      hi- is there any way you could send me your senior capstone? i'm doing a big report on this and im looking for other perspectives :)

    • @nathanielbeha833
      @nathanielbeha833 6 місяців тому

      ​@@hamstergirl-ii7su and here I am 3 years later writing on this very same poem.

  • @mindslaw4961
    @mindslaw4961 3 роки тому +2

    I like Guinness too

  • @jl-fz3um
    @jl-fz3um 4 роки тому +4

    A poem wretched in substance. The perceived beauty of the individual lines is what keeps it going.

    • @jrb4935
      @jrb4935 5 місяців тому

      Your comment is wretched in substance and has no redeeming beauty.

  • @colinmcom14
    @colinmcom14 2 роки тому +2

    Fantastic poem and performance. It really shows how devastated the world was by WW1.

  • @irenemax3574
    @irenemax3574 5 років тому +2

    Here is no water but only rock
    Rock and no water and the sandy road
    The road winding above among the mountains
    Which are mountains of rock without water
    If there were water we should stop and drink
    Amongst the rock one cannot stop or think
    Sweat is dry and feet are in the sand
    If there were only water amongst the rock
    Dead mountain mouth of carious teeth that cannot spit
    Here one can neither stand nor lie nor sit
    There is not even silence in the mountains
    But dry sterile thunder without rain
    There is not even solitude in the mountains
    But red sullen faces sneer and snarl
    From doors of mud racked houses
    If there were water
    And no rock
    If there were rock
    And also water
    And water
    A spring
    A pool among the rock
    If there were the sound of water only
    Not the cicada
    And dry grass singing
    But sound of water over a rock
    Where the hermit-thrush sings in the pine trees
    Drip drop drip drop drop drop drop
    But there is no water
    (Edit:when I read through, I discovered that Auto correct had changed CARIOUS to VARIOUS. Chortle)

  • @ThePoliticrat
    @ThePoliticrat Рік тому +6

    This is like if Oswald Spengler’s “The Decline of the West” was a poem.
    Eliot was 100% inspired by his favorite historian.

  • @paulavery1912
    @paulavery1912 Рік тому +1

    This is the first time I have heard this recording. I don't how well read it was, but will guess because it was Sir Alec Guinness reading a poem by T.S. Eliot it must be something well done. Did I enjoy the different sections? They were interesting. I have read this poem to myself before in my head and out loud several years ago. I get some of the cultural and mythological allusions. I get the poem is working on multiple levels, but am guessing as to what those levels are. One day I may study it carefully. Thank you for posting the video.

  • @sjpriv
    @sjpriv 8 років тому +6

    thank you for this masterpiece

  • @sameaston9587
    @sameaston9587 7 років тому +73

    Beautifully spoken, but I'm still lost. Eliot goes over my beanie.

    • @brandonmatuja6498
      @brandonmatuja6498 6 років тому +39

      It's "the first great cut-up collage", as another writer once said. It presents a cross-section of many ages, periods, eras, and cultures... It's not supposed to "make sense", exactly, but only to present various scenes, from the most commonplace to the most elaborate and decorous. There are many quotes and allusions from other literary and musical sources.

    • @irenemax3574
      @irenemax3574 5 років тому +12

      Forget about trying to understand it and enjoy the rhythms of the language.

    • @Rainbowthewindsage
      @Rainbowthewindsage 4 роки тому +9

      Now imagine having to write a summary of the first two poems for an english class.
      The thing about the Wasteland is that it has a ton of references to other works people and languages and if you aren't familiar with the references nor have footnotes to guide you, it's easy to get lost.

    • @cliffordbernard7663
      @cliffordbernard7663 4 роки тому +13

      It communicates before it's understood, as Eliot said poetry should. I see it as a lament for lost spiritual direction. In the wake of Darwin, and Freud, it seems that God is dead, and in the wake of the first world war, it seems that man is lost. Hence all the images of emptiness, decay, and the great unquenched thirst for spiritual renewal that pervades the poem, expressed as a hard dry land without even the sound of water. The theme is sounded at the outset in the ironic reversal of Spring (the cruelest month) that offers no renewal, only the painful awareness of what has been lost and winter, that provides at least the mercy of forgetfulness. Look at the Hollow Men for echoes of the same

    • @BrosephComrade
      @BrosephComrade 4 роки тому

      And bats with baby faces in the violet light
      Whistled, and beat their wings
      And crawled head downward down a blackened wall

  • @TeenageMutantNeckTurtle
    @TeenageMutantNeckTurtle 4 роки тому +1

    The jungle crouched, humped in silence

  • @martin4836
    @martin4836 5 років тому +1

    T.S Elliot read by Alec Guinness? Fuck yeah

  • @999TnO
    @999TnO 6 років тому +5

    Elliot is brilliant and so natural

  • @CrossPromotion
    @CrossPromotion 3 роки тому +1

    Ringed by the flat horizon only.

  • @nbenefiel
    @nbenefiel 11 місяців тому +1

    I think the proudest moment of my high school life was when I could read the Wasteland without needing any translation.

  • @NaSamymDnie16400
    @NaSamymDnie16400 4 роки тому +1

    >I read much of the night and go south in the winter
    WTF I love T.S. Eliot now

  • @federicabianchi8031
    @federicabianchi8031 8 років тому +5

    I love this so much I'm speechless.

  • @ammuananthan7521
    @ammuananthan7521 7 років тому +6

    Thank you, Sir..

  • @ZOGGYDOGGY
    @ZOGGYDOGGY Рік тому +1

    T.S. was born in St. Louis, Misery. He went to Harvard and got a doctorate in literature. He made his living as a banker and dressed like one. He emigrated to Britain and became a British subject. "The Wasteland" was first published in "Criterion" , the magazine he edited. It has been 100 years since October, 1922. Elliot's nightmare goes on. Who better to tell the tale than a well educated bourgeois financier?

  • @mottopanukeiku7406
    @mottopanukeiku7406 4 роки тому +3

    This guy sounds just like Prince Faisal- "No Arab loves the desert. We love water and green trees. There is nothing in the desert and no man needs nothing." His cadence and accent are so close to what you hear in Lawrence of Arabia. Wow, to have command of language, speaking, tone like this.. . . . . Thanks for posting this. First time I have heard it read aloud.

  • @Naa_Narratives
    @Naa_Narratives Рік тому

    I. The Burial of the Dead
    April is the cruellest month, breeding
    Lilacs out of the dead land, mixing
    Memory and desire, stirring
    Dull roots with spring rain.
    Winter kept us warm, covering
    Earth in forgetful snow, feeding
    A little life with dried tubers.
    Summer surprised us, coming over the Starnbergersee
    With a shower of rain; we stopped in the colonnade,
    And went on in sunlight, into the Hofgarten,
    And drank coffee, and talked for an hour.
    Bin gar keine Russin, stamm’ aus Litauen, echt deutsch.
    And when we were children, staying at the archduke’s,
    My cousin’s, he took me out on a sled,
    And I was frightened. He said, Marie,
    Marie, hold on tight. And down we went.
    In the mountains, there you feel free.
    I read, much of the night, and go south in the winter.
    What are the roots that clutch, what branches grow
    Out of this stony rubbish? Son of man,
    You cannot say, or guess, for you know only
    A heap of broken images, where the sun beats,
    And the dead tree gives no shelter, the cricket no relief,
    And the dry stone no sound of water. Only
    There is shadow under this red rock,
    (Come in under the shadow of this red rock),
    And I will show you something different from either
    Your shadow at morning striding behind you
    Or your shadow at evening rising to meet you;
    I will show you fear in a handful of dust.
    Frisch weht der Wind
    Der Heimat zu,
    Mein Irisch Kind,
    Wo weilest du?
    “You gave me hyacinths first a year ago;
    “They called me the hyacinth girl.”
    -Yet when we came back, late, from the Hyacinth garden,
    Your arms full, and your hair wet, I could not
    Speak, and my eyes failed, I was neither
    Living nor dead, and I knew nothing,
    Looking into the heart of light, the silence.
    Öd’ und leer das Meer.
    Madame Sosostris, famous clairvoyante,
    Had a bad cold, nevertheless
    Is known to be the wisest woman in Europe,
    With a wicked pack of cards. Here, said she,
    Is your card, the drowned Phoenician Sailor,
    (Those are pearls that were his eyes. Look!)
    Here is Belladonna, the Lady of the Rocks,
    The lady of situations.
    Here is the man with three staves, and here the Wheel,
    And here is the one-eyed merchant, and this card,
    Which is blank, is something he carries on his back,
    Which I am forbidden to see. I do not find
    The Hanged Man. Fear death by water.
    I see crowds of people, walking round in a ring.
    Thank you. If you see dear Mrs. Equitone,
    Tell her I bring the horoscope myself:
    One must be so careful these days.
    Unreal City,
    Under the brown fog of a winter dawn,
    A crowd flowed over London Bridge, so many,
    I had not thought death had undone so many.
    Sighs, short and infrequent, were exhaled,
    And each man fixed his eyes before his feet.
    Flowed up the hill and down King William Street,
    To where Saint Mary Woolnoth kept the hours
    With a dead sound on the final stroke of nine.
    There I saw one I knew, and stopped him, crying: “Stetson!
    “You who were with me in the ships at Mylae!
    “That corpse you planted last year in your garden,
    “Has it begun to sprout? Will it bloom this year?
    “Or has the sudden frost disturbed its bed?
    “Oh keep the Dog far hence, that’s friend to men,
    “Or with his nails he’ll dig it up again!
    “You! hypocrite lecteur!-mon semblable,-mon frère!”

  • @ericmatrix1
    @ericmatrix1 7 років тому +14

    This was the best reading of anything I have ever heard (other than the Bible read by James Earl Jones). I liked it more than the poem itself. Is that bad? lol.

    • @creepshowcrate
      @creepshowcrate 5 років тому

      Yes, James Earl Jones was perfect in his reading of the Bible. I have the full set of those CDs.

    • @MarvelBoi44
      @MarvelBoi44 4 роки тому

      But at my back in a cold blast I hear
      The rattle of the bones, and chuckle spread from ear to ear

  • @HarlotQueenVII
    @HarlotQueenVII 3 роки тому +1

    Here is Belladonna, the Lady of the Rocks,
    The lady of situations.
    Here is the man with three staves, and here the Wheel.

  • @cmlandresc
    @cmlandresc 4 роки тому +4

    gives me goosebumps

  • @WorldPeace-AdamNeira
    @WorldPeace-AdamNeira Місяць тому

    A wonderful reading of a great poem. Thank you for uploading it.
    I find it interesting that TS Eliot referred in this piece to Petronius, Satyricon Chapter 48: “Yes, and I myself with my own eyes saw the Sibyl hanging in a cage; and when the boys cried at her: Sibyl, Sibyl, what do you want?' 'I would that I were dead,' she used to answer.” Also, that Isaac Asimov in his short story about the omniescent, problem solving computer MULTIVAC "All the Troubles of the World" uses this quote from the Sibyl.
    😎
    Adam Neira
    Founder of World Peace 2050
    Founded in April 2000
    Paris - Jerusalem - France

  • @kirstenlogan5175
    @kirstenlogan5175 2 роки тому +1

    💜💜💜
    صفير هو زهرة الله وهو رمز للسلام والالتزام والجمال ، ولكن أيضا من القوة والفخر. غالبا ما يوجد صفير في الكنائس المسيحية كرمز للسعادة والحب.

  • @HoarseHorseMerger
    @HoarseHorseMerger 3 роки тому +2

    You cannot say, or guess, for you know only
    A heap of broken images, where the sun beats

  • @ScarJaw23
    @ScarJaw23 3 роки тому +1

    Where fishmen lounge at noon: where the walls
    Of Magnus Martyr hold
    Inexplicable splendour of Ionian white and gold

  • @pamelar3232
    @pamelar3232 8 років тому +6

    Marvelous!

  • @mthom0516
    @mthom0516 Рік тому +1

    No one ever reads the introductory “quote” about the Sybil at Cumae. It’s so important to the rest of the text.

  • @boxfox2945
    @boxfox2945 3 місяці тому

    In this' evening, brings' pale rise. Not' Morning, does begin' full day. Til' twenty, of-four their' hour's, gave. By long laid one's head, crumpled' bed sheets. Disturbed' what passing dread, had thought awakened. In-to dwelling, and pre-use' of it's bed. Where' did lost light' fade. Upon dark windows. Night begins' washing away, time's illusion. Kept solemnly' while wasted progress' of opportunity.
    Is strictly held, at length'en bay.

  • @ParadoXDestinY
    @ParadoXDestinY 4 роки тому +1

    ŠΔNTI ŠΔNTI ŠΔNTI

  • @ceridwen7785
    @ceridwen7785 Рік тому +1

    I have read The Wastelands many times since I first heard it as an angst filled teen, living in a small, coastal, Welsh village and I thought I loved it
    Having just listened to this reading, I am transported. I don't think I have ever been so moved...

  • @BrosephComrade
    @BrosephComrade 4 роки тому +1

    And bats with baby faces in the violet light
    Whistled, and beat their wings
    And crawled head downward down a blackened wall

  • @nobunnyspecial
    @nobunnyspecial 4 роки тому +5

    I cried the whole time, I don’t know why

    • @jamesboyle5232
      @jamesboyle5232 4 роки тому +1

      fuck off you absolute melt

    • @nobunnyspecial
      @nobunnyspecial 4 роки тому +1

      James Boyle why

    • @jamesboyle5232
      @jamesboyle5232 4 роки тому

      @@nobunnyspecial because i told you too. Get a fucking grip

    • @BlimaWormtong
      @BlimaWormtong 4 роки тому +1

      Madame Sosostris, famous clairvoyante,
      Had a bad cold, nevertheless
      Is known to be the wisest woman in Europe,
      With a wicked pack of cards

    • @nobunnyspecial
      @nobunnyspecial 4 роки тому

      BlimaWormtong thanks

  • @rohansask9638
    @rohansask9638 8 років тому +3

    Use the Force, Obi-Wan...

  • @kjh947
    @kjh947 2 роки тому +1

    2:34 Öd und leer das Meer

  • @EdgyTateIV
    @EdgyTateIV 3 роки тому +1

    Those are pearls that were his eyes.

  • @chewie1644
    @chewie1644 4 роки тому +1

    He who are living are dead, we who are living are dying, with a little patience.

  • @Ol-T1864
    @Ol-T1864 5 років тому +2

    Great regret: Alec Guinness died before I could marry him, or at least make love to him.

  • @Saba-mz8of
    @Saba-mz8of 2 роки тому +2

    Brilliant!

  • @MultiTaskMasterXIII
    @MultiTaskMasterXIII 4 роки тому

    I will show you fear in a handful of dust.