T S Eliot The Body

Question 1

White bodies naked on the low damp ground

Answer 1

The fire sermon
Death from ww1 is still around 
Always tarnished 
Forgotten about- no kind of respect 
Only ever disturbed by the rats 
Everyone is caught up in their own world

Question 2

The chair she sat in like a burnished throne

Answer 2

Shakespeare’s depiction of cleopatra- incredibly beautiful
Next ten lines all about her beauty
Suddenly switched to synthetic- identity is fake and superficial- rejects celebration of classic beauty and turns to moral ugliness instead

Question 3

With a bald spot in the middle of my hair

Answer 3

The love song of Alfred j prufrock
Repeated symbol of middle age
Obsessed with age like in the years
Gets older as the poem progresses

Question 4

You ought to be ashamed I said, to look so antique

It’s them pills I took to bring it off

Answer 4

First person
Comment on expectations on women- refusal of motherhood
Identity formed from being wanted by their husbands, not for what is inside.
Connection formed between lack of beauty and moral choice to have an abortion- no sympathy

Question 5

Jug jug to dirty ears

Answer 5

A game of chess
Can tell someone education from the way they look- degeneration like in SA
If not modern, you are uneducated
Ugly imagery with harsh sounds

Question 6

Are you alive or not? Is there nothing in your head?

Answer 6

A game of chess
No substance to anyone
Society is now dead as a result of modernism and industrial revolution
Shakespeare reference
Think there will be a shift with ‘But’ But it never happens
Rhetorical question- engages with audience

Question 7

Now Alberts coming back, make yourself a bit smart

Answer 7

Gender roles being defined
Only needs to make an effort when he comes back
Shows female place in society
A game of chess

Question 8

Exploring hands encounter no defence his vanity requires no response

Answer 8

Assumes he can go ahead and have sex with the typist as she doesn’t say anything
Gender roles
Violent imagery
Gender spheres and identity being repeated
Men all have the same identity in this poem- shallow brutes - generalisation

Question 9

Well if Albert won’t leave you alone, there it is I said.

Answer 9

Lil doesn’t have a say in if her husband wants sex or not
Something wrong with her for not submitting to her husband
Her body is his

Question 10

Sex

Answer 10

Other than the typist, there is no sex in the poem

Prudish in his opinions on sex