REFLECTING ON THE SONG OF THE NIGHTINGALE IN T.S. ELIOT’S THE WASTE LAND

The poem The Waste Land, written by T.S. Eliot and published in 1922, is one of the finest examples of experimentation on the new social configuration brought by modernity. In its five sections, it is a cacophony of voices, traumas and experiences. The female voices in the text are perceived in an ambiguous manner and were even considered emasculating by some critics. This chapter confronts this view of the women depicted in the poem arguing that the song of the nightingale, heard repeatedly throughout the poem, is a strong statement of Eliot’s awareness of how violence against women operates. Referring to the myth of Philomel, who was raped by her brother-in-law, the nightingale song resonates a call for justice for women in a world dominated by men. We explore the idea that there is a female archetype in The Waste Land, agreeing with Philip Sicker that all the women in the poem are in fact only one, but we propose a different reading of who this woman is and what she represents.