T.S. Eliot's Tradition and the Individual Talent, p. 1581

Normally, it would suit Amanda's perpetually capricious mood to treat the formatting of her blog as if it were some sort of spoof or gaggle or feeble impersonation, a confused montage of tribute and exposed ridiculousness. However, considering the unending riot that was my day, followed by the unnecessarily brutal beating that was my reading of The Waste Land, which resulted in the soreness of my physical and cognitive being, a soreness exacerbated by the fact that I was not given any reason as to why Eliot was so insistent upon doling out blow after passionate blow, I am simply too tired to think that much. All this blog will attempt to do is prove a theory of my own conception, which would be fitting of the thematic narcissism that laces my every post.

So, I'll use this quote to back my theory. Well, sort of a quote, I'm not going to copy the whole darn thing down:

"The mind of the poet differs from that of the immature one... being a more finely perfected medium... very varied feelings... enter into new combinations. Analogy... catalyst... two gases... mixed in the presence of... platinum, they form sulfuric acid... combination only takes place if... platinum... present;... newly formed acid contains no trace of platinum... blah, blah, blah, platinum itself... unaffected... The mind of the poet is the shred of platinum."

Christ, Eliot, just because you know every single darn word in the English language doesn't mean you need to utilize all of them just to make a point.

Anyways, it has recently come to my attention that most writers aren't ever well known, or well sold, or well written, until they are middle aged. I initially thought this had something to do with experience and all that "life teaches you" stuff, but my recent studies of brain function and health have informed me that an individual is usually middle aged before they can perform a single task with both hemispheres of their brain. So, until middle age, most people are only utilizing half of their brain power when doing almost anything they do.

I think having both sides of the brain, logical and emotional, working in harmony is a very important aspect to creating relatable, moving art. That task isn't easy for anyone, but it gets easier with experience and age. I hope. Anyways, I think what Eliot is trying to say with his alchemist, mixing-of-gasses, amalgamation metaphor is that it takes more than just one process to create a good poem, and that melding of processes comes with maturity, and is therefore the difference between mature and immature poets, and on a larger spectrum, artists.

Whew, I think that works...