Definition

1. Proper noun:
   • T. S. Eliot: The pen name of Thomas Stearns Eliot, a highly influential 20th-century poet, essayist, publisher, playwright, and literary critic. He was born in the United States but became a British subject. He is renowned for his profound impact on modern poetry and for winning the Nobel Prize in Literature.

Usage Examples

• Proper noun:
  • The poetry of T. S. Eliot is known for its complex imagery and allusions.
  • Many scholars study the works of T. S. Eliot to understand literary modernism.
  • T. S. Eliot won the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1948.

Advanced Usage

• "Eliotian" (adjective): Pertaining to or characteristic of the style, themes, or ideas of T. S. Eliot.
  • The poem's fragmented structure and urban despair are distinctly Eliotian.

Variants and Related Words

• Thomas Stearns Eliot: The full birth name of T. S. Eliot.
• The Waste Land: His most famous poem, published in 1922.
• Four Quartets: A later, highly regarded set of four poems by Eliot.
• Old Possum's Book of Practical Cats: A collection of whimsical poems by Eliot, which later inspired the musical .

Synonyms

• Poet: A writer of poems (this is a general category, not a direct synonym for the name).
• Modernist: A practitioner or supporter of modernism in the arts (describes his literary movement).

Related Phrases

• Objective correlative: A literary term famously articulated by T. S. Eliot, describing a set of objects or events that evoke a particular emotion.
• Dissociation of sensibility: A phrase coined by Eliot to describe a separation of thought and feeling he perceived in poetry after the 17th century.

Related Idioms

(As a proper noun referring to a person, there are no direct idioms. However, his work has entered common reference.) * "This is the way the world ends / Not with a bang but a whimper": A famous line from Eliot's poem "The Hollow Men," often quoted to describe an anticlimactic or feeble conclusion.

Noun

1. British poet (born in the United States) who won the Nobel prize for literature; his plays are outstanding examples of modern verse drama (1888-1965)