The Waste Land | Historical Context
World War I
While Eliot published The Waste Land in 1922, it was widely acknowledged as reflecting the disillusionment in Europe following World War I. This global war started from a regional tragedy. On June 28, 1914, Archduke Franz Ferdinand, heir to the Austro-Hungarian throne, made a fateful trip to Sarajevo, capital city of Bosnia and Herzegovina— two provinces under his family’s control—where he and his wife were assassinated. These murders reflected a regional tension among some residents of the two provinces, which wished to become part of Serbia once...
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