Debra San wrote:
> 
> I have a question about lines 191-2 of The Waste Land.  I know that
> the part about the king my father's death is adapted from what
> Ferdinand says in The Tempest, but I don't know what to make of 'the
> king my brother's wreck'.  Any thoughts?


This part of TWL is a stumper for me also, Debra.  I have a gut
feeling that it has something to do with Jean Verdenal but I've never
really come up with (or read about) a connection that appeals to me.
None-the-less, I'll pass on a few things about it.

As you noted, one allusion here is to The Tempest's "Weeping again the
king my father's wreck" but this section of the poem can also be seen
as having a comparison to the Grail legend.  I'll append a page from
my website below to explain the similarities.

Cleanth Brooks has written that the father and brother fit Wolfram von
Eschenbach's "Parzial": 'Trevrezent, the hermit, is the brother of the
Fisher King, Anfortas.  He tells Parzival. "His name all men know as
Anfortas, and I weep for him evermore."  Their father, Frimutel, is of
course dead."'  If Eliot is using this then it appears that he has
merged the two brothers into one.

For a biographical angle: in the summer of 1921, when Part III to TWL
was being composed, TSE, Vivian and TSE's brother, Henry, shared Lucy
Thayer's flat for a number of weeks (about six) while she was away and
TSE's mother and sister stayed in the Eliots' flat. Vivian wrote about
Thayer's flat that they were "encamped in attic with a glass roof."
So, at this time, Henry the father was dead and TSE was with his
brother Henry in a humble (little, low) garret.  Valerie Eliot in
"Letters of TSE" has noted that Henry, like his father, hard of
hearing, was the inspiration for Eliot's "infinitely suffering thing"
line.

Regards,
    Rick Parker



Exploring The Waste Land
A commentary page linked from The Waste Land, Part III, line 189
_________________________________________________________________

                                   Part III
                                 Lines 189-190

For gashouse think Grail Castle as Cleanth Brooks did when he compared
the lines
       189)  While I was fishing in the dull canal 
       190)  On a winter evening round behind the gashouse 

with  these  elements  of  the  Grail myth: the Fisher King, the Grail
Castle and the river passing by:

     The  castle of the Fisher King was always located on the banks of a
     river  or  on  the  sea shore. The title 'Fisher King', Miss Weston
     shows,  originates  from the use of the fish as a fertility or life
     symbol.  This  meaning,  however,  was  often forgotten, and so the
     title  in  many  of  the  later Grail romanaces is accounted for by
     describing the king as fishing. Eliot uses the reference to fishing
     for reverse effect. The reference to fishing is part of a realistic
     detail  of  the scene--'while I was fishing in the dull canal'. But
     to  the reader who knows the Weston references, the reference is to
     that  of  the  Fisher King of the Grail legends. The protagonist is
     the maimed and impotent king of the legends.

Brooks  mentions  Jesse  Weston's  ideas  on  the Grail castle and the
Fisher King. Below are some excerpts from her From Ritual to Romance.

On the Grail castle:

     We  may also note the fact that the Grail castle is always situated
     in  the  close  vicinity of water, either on or near the sea, or on
     the banks of an important river. In two cases the final home of the
     Grail  is  in  a monastery situated upon an island. The presence of
     water,  either sea, or river, is an important feature in the Adonis
     cult,  the  effigy  of the dead god being, not buried in the earth,
     but thrown into the water.

On the Fisher King:

     Robert  de  Borron  is  the  only  writer  who  gives  a clear, and
     tolerably  reasonable,  account  of  why  the guardian of the Grail
     bears  the  title of Fisher King; in other cases, such as the poems
     of  Chrétien and Wolfram, the name is connected with his partiality
     for fishing, an obviously post hoc addition.

     The  story  in  question  is found in Borron's Joseph of Arimathea.
     Here  we  are  told how, during the wanderings of that holy man and
     his  companions in the wilderness, certain of the company fell into
     sin.  By the command of God, Brons, Joseph's brother-in-law, caught
     a  Fish, which, with the Grail, provided a mystic meal of which the
     unworthy  cannot  partake; thus the sinners were separated from the
     righteous. Henceforward Brons was known as 'The Rich Fisher.' It is
     noteworthy,  however,  that  in  the  Perceval romance, ascribed to
     Borron, the title is as a rule, Roi Pescheur, not Riche Pescheur.

-------