Do I dare disturb the universe?

Our dried voices, when

we whisper together

are quiet and meaningless

as wind in dry grass

or rats’ feet over broken glass

in our dry cellar.

Shape without form, shade without colour,

paralysed force, gesture without motion;

those who have crossed

with direct eyes, to death’s other Kingdom

remember us, if at all, not as lost

violent souls, but only

as the hollow men

the stuffed men.

- T.S. Eliot

Oftentimes life appears to transition into a meaningless loop of hollowness; the mundanity and ennui is a vicious cycle that grabs a hold on our life without us realizing it. Man cannot stand a meaningless life. What is worse than leading a life that is empty? Perhaps leading a life with a flamboyant sense of purpose that is inherently hollow? One longs for a purpose that they could live and die for and struggles a great deal trying to find something outside of oneself to hold onto; something that can give clarity and guidance in the face of the unknown.

The predicament we face as humans is that we are rational beings with a strong desire to create order and clarity, and give meaning to life. This, even while we realize that we are part of an irrational and indifferent universe. In order to negate the traps of this “meaningless life”, as we call it, we need to remind ourselves that a world without meaning is an opportunity to let go of all illusions of meaning, and instead of despairing, we can choose to see the silver lining.

Thus, we end up looking for places to battle the urge to give in to the emptiness, and one such way becomes literature and poetry. Literature then becomes a possible path where one can rediscover themselves..

One such piece of poetry is The Hollow Men by T.S. Eliot. The epigraph of the poem deals with two major instances: the image of Mr. Kurtz in The Heart of Darkness and another deals with Guyfawkes and the gunpowder plot. These two men, Mr. Kurtz and Guyfawkes, have been referred to as “the hollowmen”, although they lead flamboyant lives.

The trope of hollowness was first used in the above-mentioned pieces of literature as a way to combat moral hollowness during the second world war, which was known as the early modern period. This was the time writers turned to expressing the meaninglessness of life through the realm of poetry. One such major theme was also explored through the hypocrisy of the Imperialist agenda, often termed as a philanthropic pretense; highlighting that colonialism is a sham.

The statue of a blind woman, a famous imagery used in The Heart of Darkness, is a representation of the Imperial project that is draped and hidden, blind to the havoc and catastrophic implications of the Enlightenment. The psychological representation is understood in the sense that the real nature is hidden and draped. The darkness is, thus, within the soul.

Someone who has watched the movie V for Vendetta surely must remember the limerick -

“Remember, remember the fifth of November of gunpowder treason and plot. I know of no reason why the gunpowder treason should ever be forgot.”

The gunpowder plot, that happened during the 1600’s, almost 400 years ago, was a conspiracy of capitalists to burn down the British Parliament by igniting fire in the cellars where the gunpowder was kept. However, Guyfawkes, the person behind the idea, was caught and was taken in for treachery. To this day, his effigy is burned every year. This signifies the spiritual and moral hollowness of a layman. The epigraphs then make us ponder; was Mr. Kurtz hollow? Was Guyfawkes hollow? What is hollowness?

Hollow Men is opposite to men having substance or purpose in life, which is heavily influenced by Dante’s La Vita Nuova. Men who are empty from within, who have no substance, like the effigy stuffed with nothing but clothes; men lean on against each other to stand together representing both their lack and strength of character. They are not even capable of holding each other straight. Even their voices lack conviction; they are dry and shaky, almost like whispers. “As wind in dry grass…Or rats’ feet over broken glass” suggests their forever suspension. The possibility of their redemption is bleak; it exists but they lack the spiritual energy to actually think and act. Even when the world ends for them, it doesn’t end with a bang but with a whimper.

Life takes a route to absurdity. It is the internal conflict between human tendency to find the inherent value and the meaning of life and the inability to find any. One way to change the course of the tide is to take a different route; live a little, feel a little. Literature and poetry then become a vehicle to navigate our conflicted mind to find a sense of comfort in knowing that we are not alone. Aesthetics and literature are key to save ourselves from drowning in the monotone and being forgotten forever.

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