I think there was a revolution in poetry, associated chiefly

Hear the discerning words of Howard Nemerov: “I think there was a revolution in poetry, associated chiefly with Eliot and Pound; but maybe it is of the nature of revolutions or of the nature of history that their innovations should later come to look trivial or indistinguishable from technical tricks.” In these words, he reflects upon the paradox of change: how what once seemed earth-shaking and new may, with time, appear ordinary, even mechanical. The revolution that T. S. Eliot and Ezra Pound ignited in the early twentieth century shattered the forms of Victorian verse, bringing modernism with its fragments, juxtapositions, and stark honesty. Yet Nemerov reminds us that even revolutions, when viewed from afar, can lose their fire and become routine.

The ancients themselves saw this truth. Think of Socrates, who questioned the foundations of Athens and was condemned as a corrupter. His method of dialogue was once scandalous, revolutionary, even dangerous. Yet centuries later, it became the commonplace tool of philosophy, taught to every student as a matter of course. What was once rebellion becomes tradition; what was once daring innovation can look, in hindsight, like mere technique. Nemerov thus speaks to the rhythm of history: the flame of revolution, over time, cools into the ash of convention.

Consider Eliot’s The Waste Land. When it appeared in 1922, it was a thunderclap, bewildering and electrifying, a collage of voices, myths, and fragments. To many, it was nothing less than a new scripture for the modern age. Yet today, to students and readers, its broken form and allusive density may seem less like revelation and more like exercise—a set of technical maneuvers to be imitated or decoded. Nemerov’s insight is here made plain: innovations, once absorbed by tradition, can lose their sense of urgency. What was once prophetic becomes a pattern, and patterns, in time, feel like tricks.

History gives us further examples. Beethoven’s symphonies, in their day, shocked audiences with their thunder and length, challenging the very limits of music. Today they are revered, but their radical daring has been softened by familiarity; they are now part of the canon, no longer revolution but foundation. In the same way, the Impressionist painters, once ridiculed as rebels, are now hung in the grandest museums, their innovations studied as formulae. So too in poetry, the new becomes tradition, and the tradition becomes technique.

Yet Nemerov does not dismiss Eliot or Pound. His words are not condemnation but perspective. For the revolution they wrought was real; it broke chains and opened paths. But he warns us to remember that every revolution, if it succeeds, becomes absorbed into the very history it sought to change. And in being absorbed, it may lose the rawness of its original power. This is not failure—it is simply the way of time. To mistake the trick for the truth, however, is to forget the spirit that first gave birth to the form.

The lesson for us is twofold. First, let us honor the revolutions of art not only for their techniques but for the courage that birthed them. To write as Eliot did was not merely to shuffle fragments but to speak the shattered spirit of a post-war world. To guide language as Pound did was not merely to cut words lean but to demand clarity in an age of confusion. If we imitate only the form, we betray the fire. Second, let us remember that new revolutions are always needed. The poet must not rest content with the tricks of the past, but must again and again find language that speaks to the living soul of the present.

Practical steps follow. When you read the works of innovators, do not read them as textbooks of technique, but as cries of their age. Ask what necessity gave rise to their form, and let that necessity teach you more than the pattern itself. When you write, do not imitate for cleverness’ sake; instead, write as if you were standing at the edge of history, needing to speak what has never yet been said. And in life, do not let revolutions of the past make you blind to the revolutions still needed in your time.

Thus Nemerov speaks with wisdom: every revolution fades into tradition, every innovation risks becoming trick. But this is not cause for despair—it is the eternal rhythm of history. The challenge is not to preserve the spark as relic but to light new fires, to let each generation find its own voice, as Eliot and Pound once did, and as others must still do. Let us, then, honor the past, but not be imprisoned by it; learn the forms, but not worship them; and above all, seek always the living flame that drives poetry beyond tricks into truth.