SYMBOLISM AND VISION IN MODERNIST POETRY: A COMPARATIVE ANALYSIS OF T.S. ELIOT AND EZRA POUND

This paper examines the symbolic systems and visionary aesthetics in the poetry of T.S. Eliot and Ezra Pound, two key figures of literary modernism. Through a comparative analysis of major works such as Eliot’s The Waste Land and The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock, and Pound’s The Cantos and In a Station of the Metro, the study investigates how each poet constructs meaning through metaphor, myth, and cultural allusion. While Eliot explores spiritual desolation and cultural decay through fragmented imagery, Pound develops an ideogrammic method rooted in historical and philosophical reconstruction. Their symbolic approaches reflect distinct worldviews but share a common modernist impulse to reframe reality through poetic innovation.