The Journey Of The Mgai By T. S. Eliot

The Journey of the Magi is one of Eliot’s four Ariel Poems, which was published as part of a series of illustrated Christmas greetings pamphlets. This was Eliot’s first commissioned poem.

Describing the long and tiring journey of the three kings could emphasize that the whole journey was worth struggling to see and greet the infant Jesus, but it is not what Eliot tries to express.

This narrative and cold tone makes him capable of looking at the Magi objectively and without bias. Nevertheless, even without passionate emotions and despite the varying lenght of lines and the changing rhyme schemes, the rythm and the carefully thought-out poetic figures make the Journey of the Magi a real poem. In my opinion, writing about such a well-known and holy event as the myth of the Magi in a tone like this and expressing deep fee

However, there is no further detail about Jesus and there is no sign of happiness. The arrival of the Magi at the place of Nativity is only a "satisfactory” experience. The word “satisfactory” seems too objective, too dispassionate for describing such an elevating and important experience as being there when Jesus was born.

In this verse the poet describes the whole journey and goes into details, but does not mention the traditional elements that everybody knows from the conventional Magi myth, such as the shooting star or the presents they brought to Jesus. Reading the poem we cannot feel the high spirit that the aim of the journey, greeting the Redeemer, should radiate.

After the quotation the narrator goes into details. The journey in the East could be romantic and adventurous, as it is usually described in XXth century poetry. Here it is unfriendly, frightful and deserted. Nevertheless, the “silken girls bringing sherbet” and the “summer palaces” are exotic, describing the East romantically, the way it is stereotyped in the modern West. At this part the influence of the French poet St-John Perse can be seen. Eliot translated his poem “Anabase” in 1926 and admitted that Perse had a great influence on him . The description of camels, deserts and servant girls show this influence.

The atmosphere of the first paragraph is unbiased as well, we read a cold, objective description. The narrator, one of the Magi presents the details of the journey, in a manner as if he was tired and as if he was repeating the too well known, something that he has explained many times. The first five lines are put in inverted commas. These lines are taken from Lancelot Andrews’s Nativity Sermon preached before James I on Christman Day in 1622. Eliot cites these lines in his Lancelot Andrews essay as one of those “flashing lines” which “never desert the memory” . The text given in the poem is not the original one, there are slight changes made by the poet. In the original Andrews Sermon, he also reviews the hardships of the journey and Eliot uses a few details from that later in the poem.

Nevertheless, if we think of Christ’s birth, we all know that he is going to be the one who really is faithful, innocent and generous in his life but has to die and suffer because of our sin. He had to be born to die for us. So in this case, if we think of Jesus, Birth and Death both come to our minds.

The magus says that he would take the journey again, because experiencing the birth of Jesus he started seeing clearly, and although he realised that his life until that point was not right, now he sees the future.

Then comes the most emotional part of the poem with the repeated sentence “Set down this”, a sentence also used by Lancelot Andrews. At this part a question is asked by the Magus, who did not ask anything about the journey before and obediently followed the shooting star, trusting that he does the right thing without any detail and in uncertainty. “

Some topics in this essay:
St-John Perse, Grace God”, Horse Coming, Jesus Reading, Journey Magi, Death Birth, Andrews Sermon, Magi Nativity, Lancelot Andrews, Jesus Eliot, lancelot andrews, shooting star, birth jesus, scale values, birth death, journey magi, life scale values, lines lancelot, camel left, hands dicing, continued journey, jesus world redeemer,