Essay QuestionT. S. Eliot and Dorothy Parker were post-war writers whose works, though quite different, reflected the conditions and the society of the Jazz Age. How did they view the world and in particular how did their writing, which emerged from the same suffering and confusion, express their view? In what ways is their work similar and or different? Refer to specific aspects of their work in your answer.
Essay by Claire 8TDorothy Parker and T.S.Eliot both had a bleak view of life, but for very different reasons. T.S.Eliot was disappointed with the modern world, thinking that people were not ready for the change. He also thought that the complete lack of faith or belief was to create an era of careless, materialistic, pointless lives. He seemed to believe that the new technology would bring on a sort of apocalypse, not ending the world but making one full of people having nothing to do in it. They would have no purpose or reason to be alive, as all their duties will have been taken over by machines. Dorothy Parker, on the other hand, had a bleak outlook; because of her failed relationships, her attitude towards men. Her stories are about her own life, her wondering about her role as a woman. T.s.Eliot felt that modern society had no more faith, no more values., but Dorothy Parker was actually part of this modern society.
T.S.Eliot wrote of the reconstruction after the war, and the title of his poem, ‘The Waste Land’, perhaps implies that this is what the world had become. He questions whether or not life will start again:
‘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?’
Some of the other verses of his poem speak of people returning to their lives after the pain and suffering of war, new things emerging from the new era and of people going through automatic routines.
But Dorothy Parkers stories and verses are all about women in failed relationships, women who are losing or have lost their lovers.
T.S.Eliot’s writing was like the harsh truth, with a certain ‘we’ll all die at the end’ attitude about it. Dorothy Parker was more witty and cynical, as it she were saying, ‘well look at the women of today. I guess I’m just like them but there’s nothing to be done about it is there?’
Dorothy Parker and T.S.Eliot were writers of the same era but they are extremely different - Eliot had a bleak view of the modern world in general, and Dorothy Parker a bleak view of her role as a woman in the modern world. T.S. Eliot’s writing showed that he was like an outsider looking in on the people in this new world;‘She turns and looks a moment in the glass,
Hardly aware of her departed lover;
Her brain allows one half formed thought to pass:
‘Well now that’s done: and I’m glad it’s over.’
When lovely woman stoops to folly and
Paces about her room again, alone,
She smoothes her hair with an automatic hand,
And puts a record on the gramophone.’This verse especially contrasts with Dorothy Parker’s stories, which are all about women who are very aware of their departed lovers. She is an insider, she shows more of these people’s feelings, what they are saying. This is also because she is part of the society they both speak of, and because she is a woman and writes about women mainly. Many of her stories are monologues or dialogues, and it is always very clear whether it is one or the other. In Eliot’s poem ‘The Waste Land’, the writing changes from narrative verse to a dialogue and back again many times. He sometimes even chooses to leave out the quotation marks.
T.S.Eliot did not write for a living as Dorothy Parker did. He was a bank clerk and wrote because he was an artist. Dorothy Parker wrote for the public, for their entertainment and amusement. Her stories were short and simple in comparison to T.S.Eliot’s long and complex works; aimed mainly at intellectuals and scholars. He was a very dramatic poet, and his poetry was always full of voices, the whole expressing a sense of impending doom. Dorothy Parker’s stories contrast with his bleak poems: they are cynical an yet witty and clever, sarcastic and yet humorous and frivolous, much like herself. Her stories are based on real situations that she herself probably lived.
Despite their similarities, the differences between Dorothy Parker’s and T.S.Eliot’s writing styles contrast greatly. They can be compared and they can be put side by side as two writers of the 1920’s or as two writers with bleak outlooks on life, but because their similarities end there, they can be placed in no other common category. They cannot be judged as equals and it cannot be said that one is a greater writer than the other because the differences in their writing, their lifestyles, and their probable influences are by far too numerous.
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