Tradition and the

Individual Talent

"Tradition and the Individual Talent" (1919) is an essay writ t en by poet and lit erary crit ic T. S.
Eliot . The essay was first published in The Egoist (1919) and lat er in Eliot 's first book of crit icism,
"The Sacred Wood" (1920).[1] The essay is also available in Eliot 's "Select ed Prose" and "Select ed
Essays".

While Eliot is most oft en known for his poet ry, he also cont ribut ed t o t he field of lit erary
crit icism. In t his dual role, he act ed as a cult ural crit ic, comparable t o Sir Philip Sidney and Samuel
Taylor Coleridge. "Tradit ion and t he Individual Talent " is one of t he more well known works t hat
Eliot produced in his crit ic capacit y. It formulat es Eliot 's influent ial concept ion of t he relat ionship
bet ween t he poet and preceding lit erary t radit ions.

Content of the essay

This essay is divided int o t hree part s: first t he concept of "Tradit ion," t hen t he Theory of
Impersonal Poet ry, and finally t he conclusion.

Eliot present s his concept ion of t radit ion and t he definit ion of t he poet and poet ry in relat ion t o
it . He wishes t o correct t he fact t hat , as he perceives it , "in English writ ing we seldom speak of
t radit ion, t hough we occasionally apply it s name in deploring it s absence." Eliot posit s t hat ,
t hough t he English t radit ion generally upholds t he belief t hat art progresses t hrough change – a
separat ion from t radit ion, lit erary advancement s are inst ead recognised only when t hey conform
t o t he t radit ion. Eliot , a classicist , felt t hat t he t rue incorporat ion of t radit ion int o lit erat ure was
unrecognised, t hat t radit ion, a word t hat "seldom... appear[s] except in a phrase of censure," was
act ually a t hus-far unrealised element of lit erary crit icism.

For Eliot , t he t erm "t radit ion" is imbued wit h a special and complex charact er. It represent s a
"simult aneous order," by which Eliot means a hist orical t imelessness – a fusion of past and
present – and, at t he same t ime, a sense of present t emporalit y. A poet must embody "t he
whole of t he lit erat ure of Europe from Homer," while, simult aneously, expressing t heir
cont emporary environment . Eliot challenges t he common percept ion t hat a poet 's great ness and
individualit y lie in t heir depart ure from t heir predecessors; he argues t hat "t he most individual
part s of his [t he poet 's] work may be t hose in which t he dead poet s, his ancest ors, assert t heir
immort alit y most vigorously." Eliot claims t hat t his "hist orical sense" is not only a resemblance t o
t radit ional works but an awareness and underst anding of t heir relat ion t o his poet ry.

This fidelit y t o t radit ion, however, does not require t he great poet t o forfeit novelt y in an act of
surrender t o repet it ion. Rat her, Eliot has a much more dynamic and progressive concept ion of t he
poet ic process: novelt y is possible only t hrough t apping int o t radit ion. When a poet engages in
t he creat ion of new work, t hey realise an aest het ic "ideal order," as it has been est ablished by t he
lit erary t radit ion t hat has come before t hem. As such, t he act of art ist ic creat ion does not t ake
place in a vacuum. The int roduct ion of a new work alt ers t he cohesion of t his exist ing order, and
causes a readjust ment of t he old t o accommodat e t he new. The inclusion of t he new work alt ers
t he way in which t he past is seen; element s of t he past t hat are not ed and realised. In Eliot ’s own
words, "What happens when a new work of art is creat ed is somet hing t hat happens
simult aneously t o all t he works of art t hat preceded it ." Eliot refers t o t his organic t radit ion, t his
developing canon, as t he "mind of Europe." The privat e mind is subsumed by t his more massive
one.

This leads t o Eliot ’s so-called "Impersonal Theory" of poet ry. Since t he poet engages in a
"cont inual surrender of himself" t o t he vast order of t radit ion, art ist ic creat ion is a process of
depersonalisat ion. The mat ure poet is viewed as a medium, t hrough which t radit ion is channelled
and elaborat ed. He compares t he poet t o a cat alyst in a chemical react ion, in which t he
react ant s are feelings and emot ions t hat are synt hesised t o creat e an art ist ic image t hat
capt ures and relays t hese same feelings and emot ions. While t he mind of t he poet is necessary
for t he product ion, it emerges unaffect ed by t he process. The art ist st ores feelings and
emot ions and properly unit es t hem int o a specific combinat ion, which is t he art ist ic product .
What lends great ness t o a work of art are not t he feelings and emot ions t hemselves, but t he
nat ure of t he art ist ic process by which t hey are synt hesised. The art ist is responsible for
creat ing "t he pressure, so t o speak, under which t he fusion t akes place." And, it is t he int ensit y of
fusion t hat renders art great . In t his view, Eliot reject s t he t heory t hat art expresses
met aphysical unit y in t he soul of t he poet . The poet is a depersonalised vessel, a mere medium.

Great works do not express t he personal emot ion of t he poet . The poet does not reveal t heir
own unique and novel emot ions, but rat her, by drawing on ordinary ones and channelling t hem
t hrough t he int ensit y of poet ry, t hey express feelings t hat surpass, alt oget her, experienced
emot ion. This is what Eliot int ends when he discusses poet ry as an "escape from emot ion." Since
successful poet ry is impersonal and, t herefore, exist s independent of it s poet , it out lives t he
poet and can incorporat e int o t he t imeless "ideal order" of t he "living" lit erary t radit ion.

Anot her essay found in Selected Essays relat es t o t his not ion of t he impersonal poet . In "Hamlet
and His Problems" Eliot present s t he phrase "object ive correlat ive." The t heory is t hat t he
expression of emot ion in art can be achieved by a specific, and almost formulaic, prescript ion of
a set of object s, including event s and sit uat ions. A part icular emot ion is creat ed by present ing it s
correlat ed object ive sign. The aut hor is depersonalised in t his concept ion, since he is t he mere
effect er of t he sign. And, it is t he sign, and not t he poet , which creat es emot ion.

The implicat ions here separat e Eliot 's idea of t alent from t he convent ional definit ion (just as his
idea of Tradit ion is separat e from t he convent ional definit ion), one so far from it , perhaps, t hat he
chooses never t o direct ly label it as t alent . The convent ional definit ion of t alent , especially in
t he art s, is a genius t hat one is born wit h. Not so for Eliot . Inst ead, t alent is acquired t hrough a
careful st udy of poet ry, claiming t hat Tradit ion, "cannot be inherit ed, and if you want it , you must
obt ain it by great labour." Eliot assert s t hat it is absolut ely necessary for t he poet t o st udy, t o
have an underst anding of t he poet s before t hem, and t o be well versed enough t hat t hey can
underst and and incorporat e t he "mind of Europe" int o t heir poet ry. But t he poet 's st udy is unique
– it is knowledge t hat "does not encroach," and t hat does not "deaden or pervert poet ic
sensibilit y." It is, t o put it most simply, a poet ic knowledge – knowledge observed t hrough a
poet ic lens. This ideal implies t hat knowledge gleaned by a poet is not knowledge of fact s, but
knowledge which leads t o a great er underst anding of t he mind of Europe. As Eliot explains,
"Shakespeare acquired more essent ial hist ory from Plut arch t han most men could from t he
whole Brit ish Museum."

Eliot and New Criticism

Criticism of Eliot

Eliot 's t heory of lit erary t radit ion has been crit icised for it s limit ed definit ion of what const it ut es
t he canon of t hat t radit ion. He assumes t he aut horit y t o choose what represent s great poet ry,
and his choices have been crit icised on several front s. For example, Harold Bloom disagrees wit h
Eliot 's condescension t owards Romant ic poet ry, which, in The Metaphysical Poets (1921) he
crit icises for it s "dissociat ion of sensibilit y." Moreover, many believe Eliot 's discussion of t he
lit erary t radit ion as t he "mind of Europe" reeks of Euro-cent rism. However, it should be
recognized t hat Eliot support ed many East ern and t hus non-European works of lit erat ure such as
t he Mahabharata. Eliot was arguing t he import ance of a complet e sensibilit y: he didn't part icularly
care what it was at t he t ime of t radit ion and t he individual t alent . His own work is heavily
influenced by non-West ern t radit ions. In his broadcast t alk "The Unit y of European Cult ure," he
said, "Long ago I st udied t he ancient Indian languages and while I was chiefly int erest ed at t hat
t ime in Philosophy, I read a lit t le poet ry t oo; and I know t hat my own poet ry shows t he influence
of Indian t hought and sensibilit y." His self-evaluat ion was confirmed by B. P. N. Sinha, who writ es
t hat Eliot went beyond Indian ideas t o Indian form: "The West has preoccupied it self almost
exclusively wit h t he philosophy and t hought s of India. One consequence of t his has been a t ot al
neglect of Indian forms of expression, i.e. of it s lit erat ure. T. S. Eliot is t he one major poet whose
work bears evidence of int ercourse wit h t his aspect of Indian cult ure" (qt d. in The Composition
of The Four Quart et s). He does not account for a non-whit e and non-masculine t radit ion. As such,
his not ion of t radit ion st ands at odds wit h feminist , post -colonial and minorit y t heories.

Harold Bloom present s a concept ion of t radit ion t hat differs from t hat of Eliot . Whereas Eliot
believes t hat t he great poet is fait hful t o his predecessors and evolves in a concordant manner,
Bloom (according t o his t heory of "anxiet y of influence") envisions t he "st rong poet " t o engage in
a much more aggressive and t umult uous rebellion against t radit ion.

In 1964, his last year, Eliot published in a reprint of The Use of Poetry and the Use of Criticism, a
series of lect ures he gave at Harvard Universit y in 1932 and 1933, a new preface in which he
called "Tradit ion and t he Individual Talent " t he most juvenile of his essays (alt hough he also
indicat ed t hat he did not repudiat e it .)[2]
Primary works of literary criticism by T. S. Eliot

Homage to John Dryden: Three Essays on Poetry of the Seventeenth Century. London: L. and
Virginia Woolf, 1927.

On Poetry and Poets. London: Faber and Faber, 1957.

The Sacred Wood: Essays on Poetry and Criticism. London Ment huen, 1950.

Selected Essays. New York: Harcourt , Brace, 1950.

The Varieties of Metaphysical Poetry. Ed. Ronald Schuchard. London: Faber and Faber, 1993.

See also

Great Conversat ion

Post -colonialism

References

1. Gallup, Donald. T. S. Eliot: A Bibliography (A Revised and Extended Edition) Harcourt, Brace & World,
New York, 1969. pp. 27–8, 204–5 (listings A5, C90, C7)

2. Eliot, T.S., The Use of Poetry and the Use of Criticism", 1964 edition, Harvard University Press,
Cambridge, Preface

External links

Wikisource has original t ext relat ed t o t his art icle:

"Tradit ion and t he Individual Talent " in The Egoist at t he Modernist Journals Project : Part I in
vol. 6, no. 4 (Sept . 1919) (ht t p://dl.lib.brown.edu/mjp/render.php?id=1308761641493752&view=
mjp_ object ) , Part s II-III in vol. 6, no. 5 (Dec. 1919) (ht t p://dl.lib.brown.edu/mjp/render.php?id=
1308762019900002&view=mjp_ object ) .
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