The progress of an artist is a continual self-sacrifice, a continual extinction of personality. Give a reasoned answer
T. S. Eliot is one of the most influential of all modern critics. Really, he is a great man of letters of the present century. He is a great poet-critic like Dryden and Wordsworth. Eliot has written a number of critical essays and articles. He remains a landmark in the field of modern literary criticism. In this regard, it will be worthwhile to quote the words of George Watson in a simple sense."
"Eliol made English criticism look different though not in This view and many other views of great critics like John Hayward have written about the greatness of Eliot as a literary critic
Tradition and Individual Talent' is one of the well-known and thought-provoking essays of Eliot. As the title itself indicates, the essay is about the tradition of great poets of the past and the individual poet of any age.
However, what is very remarkable in the essay is Eliot's theory of the impersonality of poetry. This theory has increased the importance of Eliot as a critic, as the touchstone theory of Arnold and the theory of Imitation in poetry given by Aristotle have made the great. This theory is described as a 'Revolutionary theory by Eliot.
Regarding the importance of the theory. A. G. George comments "Eliot's theory of the impersonality of poetry is the greatest theory on the nature of the poetic process after Wordsworth's romantic conception of poetry." This great theory is discussed by Eliot in the second part of the essay Tradition and Individual Talent. The third and very short also sums up the theory.
The theory has really created a sensation among critics, Eliot's theory of the impersonality of poetry can be discussed in detail as follows. Eliot is an existentialist and a classicist. So he gives a bold statement that in poetry the emotion of the poet is not necessarily present. He has criticised Wordsworth's view that poetry has its origin in emotions recollected in tranquillity.
To Eliot, poetry is not an overflow of emotions' nor is it 'emotion' recollected in tranquillity. In fact, it is an escape from personality and from emotion. It evokes an emotion which is not personal emotion but artistic emotion. It is, therefore, not the 'expression of the personality but an escape from personality.
The personality of the poet is not in it. The art of poetry is completely depersonalised. Honest criticism and sensitive appreciation are directed not at the poet but at the poet. Likewise, according to Eliot, poetry is an organisation of different concepts and for such organisation to take place perfect objectivity on the part of the poet is essential. There is no question of the poet expressing his personal emotions.
Such is the nature of the impersonality of poetry theory. The poetic process is the typical process. The poet's emotions must be depersonalised. He must be as impersonal and objective as a scientist. The personality of the artist is not important, the important thing is his sense of tradition. A good poem is a living whole of all the poetry that has ever been written. He must forget his personal joys and sorrows and be absorbed in acquiring a sense of tradition and expressing it in his poetry.
Thus, the poet's personality is merely a medium, having the same significance as a catalytic agent or a receptacle in which a chemical reaction takes place. That is why, the poet holds that 'honest criticism and sensitive appreciation is directed not upon the poet but upon the poetry. T. S. Eliot gives a very fine analogy in order to explain the above fact.
There is a jar containing oxygen and sulphur dioxide. These two gases combine to form sulphurous acid when a fine filament of platinum is introduced into the jar. The combination takes place only in the presence of the piece of platinum. But the metal itself does not undergo any change. It remains unaffected. The mind of the poet is like the catalytic agent. Combinations of emotions and experiences must take place, but it does not undergo any change during the process of poetic combination.
The mind of the poet is constantly forming emotions and experiences into new wholes, but the new combination does not contain even a trace of the poet's mind, just as the newly formed sulphurous acid does not contain any trace of platinum. The mind of a young poet or his personal emotions may find some expression in his composition. But T. S. Eliot says: "The more perfect the artist, the more completely separate in him. Will be the man who suffers and the mind which creates."
Thus, in this essay, Eliot opposes the Romantic theory of the poet as self-expression. By doing so the critic has given a new direction to literary criticism. In Eliot's view, poetry is not merely the expression of personality, and the poetic process does not involve mere self-expression. The poetic process is the process of depersonalisation. To quote Eliot: "A continual surrender of himself as he (Eliot) is at the moment to something which is more valuable, the progress of an artist is continual extinction of personality."
In this way, the subjective view of poetry stressed by the romantics is replaced by the Romantics is replaced by the impersonality in art. Further in the escape Eliot again remarks that poetry is not a turning loose of emotion, but an escape from emotion, it is not the expression of personality, but an escape from personality.
Some critics of Eliot interpret this fact as a denial of any personality to a poet. But in reality, Eliot does not deny personality to a poet. On the other hand, he insists upon the point that the poetic process is the 'continual extinction of personality', a surrender of personal emotion to the emotion of art.
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