T.S. Eliot

[Woland]

What do you make of his work? The author of the epic "The Wasteland" also wrote some of the most charming light verse about cats as well as a play concerining christian martyrdom. What do you make of his work? Will it endure to influence later generations (as he influenced the post war writers)? Is there any evidence of contempary writers being influenced by Eliot?

[Virgil]

Several reasons why I think he will endure. (1) The Waste Land defines the literature of subsequent to World War I. (2) He is at the fore front of modern poetry. He was among the first if not the first to write poetry with a dislocated (I can't think of a better word right now) style that is widely prevalent today. (3) He may not have a huge opus, but what he wrote is just flat out great writing.

[mono]

Any work by T.S. Eliot I have always found as poetry with some of the greatest of allusions and reverence toward past literature, philosophy, poetry, and culture. For this reason, I have never found him easy to read, but I certainly agree with Virgil's very wise observations, especially in reference to Eliot's 'dislocated' (I like your terminology ;)) verses, which spread greatly to future poets - we all know E.E. Cummings, Theodore Roethke, Sylvia Plath, and the beat poets, right?
Out of all of the legends and epic writers of literature, I would consider T.S. Eliot as one of the latest, and, no doubt, his literature will successfully battle the test and trials of time.