Oneness Of Literature

Online Discussion: Oneness of Literature

This Blog is a part of classroom activities in which students have to interpret two works one is T.S.Eliot's 'Wasteland' and another is the story ' The Joke' by Anton Chekhov.

All literature are connected with each other; all, those which are already written, those being written and those yet to be written. Thus, to understand a work of art, one must have an outstanding of this continuity.

literature is like a flowing river it has many way to flow but its root is one. Hence, as per many theorist like T.S.Eliot, Northrop Fry etc that the structures of literature are somewhat connected with each other like similar in symbols, signs, structure etc. Northrop Frye in his theory of Archetypal criticism based on the idea that whole of the literature has oneness of its existence. All literature shares common DNA or Skeleton. While, T.S.Eliot said in his "Tradition and Individual talent" that past is very important for new because any kind of literature bring the basic structure from the past work of art. Hence, he said that poet should know the pastness of the past.

We have many different ages' works of literature having same structure related to other works like John Donne poetry, Andrew Marvell, T.S.Eliot, etc. All works have similar theme of sexual perversion, so we can say that literature somewhat related with each other. Here we are not going to see above works but we will see the similarities between 'Joke' and 'Wasteland.'

There is one stanza in the poem "Wasteland" which is very similar to the story of Anton Chekhov "The Joke"

And when we were children, staying at the archduke's,

My cousin's, he took me out on a sled,

Marie, hold on tight. And down we went.

In the mountains, there you feel free

Interpretation:

The stanza of the poem is much connected with the story "The joke". Both have same theme in "wasteland" about childhood memory and hidden sexuality and "The joke" a visible lust both have same theme of sexual perversion and also the same symbols used the symbol of mountain and down of sled only the name is changed Marie instead Nadia. In the story Lover many time uttered the words 'I love you' but as per my views it is not pure love but sexual perversion because pure love not need any kind of words uttering frequently but lover was sexually perverse like John Donne's poems. So, we can say that every works have oneness and somewhat connected with each other.

Gujarati Translation of the story:

Translation always is different than original works. We can not get the real charm or feelings of the work in translated version. Hence, there are many words like the title of the story "The Joke" and "Nanakdi majak" there is no appropriate word of 'sled' and many more.