What are the roots that clutch, what branches grow
Out of this stony rubbish? Son of man,
You cannot say, or guess, for you know only
A heap of broken images, where the sun beats,
And the dead tree gives no shelter, the cricket no relief,
And the dry stone no sound of water. Only
There is shadow under this red rock,
(Come in under the shadow of this red rock),
And I will show you something different from either
Your shadow at morning striding behind you
Or your shadow at evening rising to meet you;
I will show you fear in a handful of dust.
--from T. S. Eliot, The Waste Land (1922)
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alfa-16
15 years ago
Don't take anything Christopher Sykes (or Wikipedia) says for granted. Sykes himself confessed he couldn't spot the relevance of the Eliot quote. When the word 'ashes' was changed to 'dust', it could have been the bible 'ashes to ashes, dust to dust' but I'd like to think it was Shakespeare's Cymbeline that Waugh was thinking about.
Fear no more the heat o' the sun,
Nor the furious winter's rages;
Thou thy worldly task hast done,
Home art gone, and ta'en thy wages;
Golden lads and girls all must,
As chimney-sweepers, come to dust
Fear no more the lightning-flash,
Nor the all-dreaded thunder-stone;
Fear not slander, censure rash;
Thou hast finished joy and moan;
To lovers young, all lovers must
Consign to thee, and come to dust.
A handful of dust is how we all end up. Eliot in his poem is also referring back to the same Shakespearean use of 'dust'. Since Waugh didn't start out by quoting Eliot, I think it's a coincidence that he ended up by doing so, even though Waugh knew and admired The Waste Land.
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kaream
15 years ago
An interesting suggestion. I confess I don't know who Christopher Sykes is (and I haven't looked at the wikipedia article), but whether Waugh may have preferred not to use a direct quotation from Eliot, his theme is not so much death as it is helplessly coming to grief, having one's hopes and dreams and expectations of life ground away - to dust, or to ashes.
"Coincidence" seems a strong word to me. Just as Eliot's imagery and choice of language lend themselves to layers of interpretation, including Shakespeare and the bible among others, Waugh was not an unsophisticated writer, and the whole point of a title like this is to encourage an astute reader to puzzle out antecedents and possible meanings. "Ashes" would have been a more indirect reference to The Waste Land, but clearly the connection was intended - Sykes' inability to see its relevance notwithstanding. If you read it carefully, Eliot's entire stanza quoted above can be seen as a parable of Tony's "journey" from his initial social standing, through his marriage, to his ultimate fate.
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icequeen_vienna
14 years ago
Because everyone ends up with nothing.
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BelleCBelle
8 years ago
Oh, just read Waugh because he's brilliant at satire and straight comedy and black comedy. I found him after buying an old copy of Brideshead Revisited at thirteen and then continued to buy all of his writings, one after another. Personally I don't read Waugh in the same way that I read Dickens - I read Waugh for fun, like PG Wodehouse.
"Think you'll ever get me out of your blood?" "Maybe not but love has got to stop short of suicide!"
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