Tradition and the Individual Talent

Throughout “Tradition and the Individual Talent,” Eliot refers to the immature poet. The immature poet is someone who never gets beyond a certain stage, never becoming a traditional poet and never adopting the Impersonal Theory. In Part I, Eliot says that, when talking about a poet’s being traditional, he does not mean “the impressionable period of adolescence, but the period of full maturity.” Eliot says that, if a poet wants to keep writing after their 25th year, they will need to develop a mature and deep consciousness of the past, and of the entire past, not just of notable periods or of people they youthfully admire. In Part II, Eliot implies that an immature poet would approach poetry too egotistically. They would pursue poetry in order to express their own emotions and experiences, and they would seek thrills in order to have new things to write about. In contrast, a mature poet would understand that poetry writing is an impersonal experience and therefore wouldn’t involve their personal lives in it at all.