A Gadamerian-Hermeneutic Reflection on T. S. Eliot and W. B. Yeats’s Poetics

Abstract

ABSTRACT This article investigates the hermeneutical dimension of T. S. Eliot and W. B. Yeats’s poetics vis-à-vis H.-G. Gadamer’s philosophical hermeneutics. The study stems from a remarkable observation that Eliot and Yeats not only anticipate what Gadamer has systematically explained in his philosophical project, but they also present a new kind of poetry that can easily yield itself to a Gadamerian reading—one that is primarily based on the principle of hermeneutical situation and dialogue. The article strives for a critical study that focuses on the relevance of Gadamer’s hermeneutics to reading and interpreting the poetry of Eliot and Yeats, as well as uncovering the underlying kinship between their hermeneutic reflection on the nature of poetry, truth, history, and understanding. The analysis undertaken has yielded interesting results, bestowing Eliot and Yeats as poets-philosophers who are genuinely aware of what Gadamer has advanced in his philosophy. This hermeneutic consciousness ingrained in Eliot and Yeats’s thoughts is the main motive that drives them to experiment with tradition, myth, symbolism, and musicality, in order to provide the reader with dialogic poetry, which Gadamer himself highly admires for its ability to facilitate the disclosure of truth.