I consider myself a “sophisticated” reader of poetry. I’m especially fond of Eliot - who is an acquired taste. I’ve never read the real Eliot poem, and don’t l

I consider myself a “sophisticated” reader of poetry. I’m especially fond of Eliot - who is an acquired taste. I’ve never read the real Eliot poem, and don’t like it much. I searched for it. It was written before Eliot was known, and before he moved from America to Britain. That’s important, as I’d assumed it was taking place in Britain, and Eliot’s poetry is extremely location sensitive. It also seems to be part of a “triplet” - three poems that go together. Eliot was very inconsistent about which poems went with which. The best practice is to include any possible “other parts.” Reading the other poems in the triplet provides important context, but they’re still not great literature. Maybe people don’t like it because it was just one of Eliot’s crappier poems? Edit: the Eliot poem was published shortly after he moved to the UK. But that makes the American context provided by the other poems more important.