historical sense

The "historical sense" is an important part of writing and reading poetry in a mature way, according to T. S. Eliot: "the historical sense involves a perception, not only of the pastness of the past, but of its presence; the historical sense compels a man to write not merely with his own generation in his bones, but with a feeling that the whole of the literature of Europe from Homer and within it the whole of the literature of his own country has a simultaneous existence and composes a simultaneous order." If a writer has this sense, then he will not merely express personal emotions in poetry or try to be original but open himself up to the past and see how he is part of a tradition bigger than himself. Each new work of art is influenced by this tradition and changes this tradition. The historical sense can also help us, as readers of literature, not think only of ourselves when we try to understand a work of literature.