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T.S. Eliot's ghostly compound: Coleridge and Whitman in 'Little Gidding II.'

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From: ANQ
Date: 19970101
Author:Chandran, K. Narayana

T.S. Eliot's poem 'Little Gidding II' uses Samuel Taylor Coleridge and Walt Whitman as models for the character of the ghost. Eliot was careful to avoid identifications of the spectral poet, and would never admit who he had in mind. However, analysis of the poem's second movement shows similarities to lines from Coleridge and Whitman. These resemblances are more pronounced when first draft lines of Eliot's poem are considered.

The second movement of Little Gidding II is probably the happiest congruence of aim and effect in Eliot. The poet compounds his masters in one ghost and further ...

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