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Journey of the Magi

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‘A cold coming we had of it, Just the worst time of the year For a journey, and such a long journey: The ways deep and the weather sharp, The very dead of winter.’ And the camels galled, sore-footed, refractory, Lying down in the melting snow. There were times we regretted The summer palaces on slopes, the terraces, And the silken girls bringing sherbet. Then the camel men cursing and grumbling And running away, and wanting their liquor and women, And the night-fires going out, and the lack of shelters, And the cities hostile and the towns unfriendly And the villages dirty and charging high prices: A hard time we had of it. At the end we preferred to travel all night, Sleeping in snatches, With the voices singing in our ears, saying That this was all folly.

Then at dawn we came down to a temperate valley, Wet, below the snow line, smelling of vegetation; With a running stream and a water-mill beating the darkness, And three trees on the low sky, And an old white horse galloped away in the meadow. Then we came to a tavern with vine-leaves over the lintel, Six hands at an open door dicing for pieces of silver, And feet kicking the empty wine-skins, But there was no information, and so we continued And arrived at evening, not a moment too soon Finding the place; it was (you may say) satisfactory.

All this was a long time ago, I remember, And I would do it again, but set down This set down This: were we led all that way for Birth or Death? There was a Birth, certainly, We had evidence and no doubt. I had seen birth and death, But had thought they were different; this Birth was Hard and bitter agony for us, like Death, our death. We returned to our places, these Kingdoms, But no longer at ease here, in the old dispensation, With an alien people clutching their gods. I should be glad of another death.

This poem is in the public domain. Published in Poem-a-Day on December 24, 2023, by the Academy of American Poets.

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The Journey Of The Magi

A cold coming we had of it, Just the worst time of the year For a journey, and such a long journey: The ways deep and the weather sharp, The very dead of winter.' And the camels galled, sorefooted, refractory, Lying down in the melting snow. There were times we regretted The summer palaces on slopes, the terraces, And the silken girls bringing sherbet. Then the camel men cursing and grumbling and running away, and wanting their liquor and women, And the night-fires going out, and the lack of shelters, And the cities hostile and the towns unfriendly And the villages dirty and charging high prices: A hard time we had of it. At the end we preferred to travel all night, Sleeping in snatches, With the voices singing in our ears, saying That this was all folly. Then at dawn we came down to a temperate valley, Wet, below the snow line, smelling of vegetation; With a running stream and a water-mill beating the darkness, And three trees on the low sky, And an old white horse galloped away in the meadow. Then we came to a tavern with vine-leaves over the lintel, Six hands at an open door dicing for pieces of silver, And feet kicking the empty wine-skins. But there was no information, and so we continued And arriving at evening, not a moment too soon Finding the place; it was (you might say) satisfactory. All this was a long time ago, I remember, And I would do it again, but set down This set down This: were we led all that way for Birth or Death? There was a Birth, certainly We had evidence and no doubt. I had seen birth and death, But had thought they were different; This Birth was Hard and bitter agony for us, like Death, our death. We returned to our places, these Kingdoms, But no longer at ease here, in the old dispensation, With an alien people clutching their gods. I should be glad of another death.

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Journey of the magi.

by T. S. Eliot

Journey of the Magi - T. S. Eliot

I think this is the first time I've ever read any of my own poems over the radio for either an American or an English audience, though I've done so once or twice for overseas services...I shall now take one of my 'Ariel' poems. 'Ariel Poems' was the title of a series of poems which included many other poets as well as myself. These were all new poems which were published during four or five successive years as a kind of Christmas card. Nobody else seemed to want the title afterward so I kept it for myself, simply to designate four of my poems which appeared in this way. 'Journey of the Magi' is obviously a subject suitable for the Christmas season.

‘A cold coming we had of it, Just the worst time of the year For a journey, and such a long journey: The ways deep and the weather sharp, The very dead of winter.’ And the camels galled, sore-footed, refractory, Lying down in the melting snow. There were times we regretted The summer palaces on slopes, the terraces, And the silken girls bringing sherbet. Then the camel men cursing and grumbling And running away, and wanting their liquor and women, And the night-fires going out, and the lack of shelters, And the cities hostile and the towns unfriendly And the villages dirty and charging high prices: A hard time we had of it. At the end we preferred to travel all night, Sleeping in snatches, With the voices singing in our ears, saying That this was all folly.

Then at dawn we came down to a temperate valley, Wet, below the snow line, smelling of vegetation; With a running stream and a water-mill beating the darkness, And three trees on the low sky, And an old white horse galloped away in the meadow. Then we came to a tavern with vine-leaves over the lintel, Six hands at an open door dicing for pieces of silver, And feet kicking the empty wine-skins, But there was no information, and so we continued And arrived at evening, not a moment too soon Finding the place; it was (you may say) satisfactory.

All this was a long time ago, I remember, And I would do it again, but set down This set down This: were we led all that way for Birth or Death? There was a Birth, certainly, We had evidence and no doubt. I had seen birth and death, But had thought they were different; this Birth was Hard and bitter agony for us, like Death, our death. We returned to our places, these Kingdoms, But no longer at ease here, in the old dispensation, With an alien people clutching their gods. I should be glad of another death.

Journey of the Magi is from Collected Poems 1909-1962 (Faber, 1974), by permission of the publisher, Faber & Faber Ltd and kind support of The T S Eliot Foundation. Recording by permission of the BBC. Find the T S Eliot Foundation here: https://tseliot.com/ Find our T S Eliot Prize Winners’ Collection, supported by the T S Eliot Foundation, here: https://poetryarchive.org/collections/t-s-eliot-prize/

T. S. Eliot

The free tracks you can enjoy in the Poetry Archive are a selection of a poet’s work. Our catalogue store includes many more recordings which you can download to your device.

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Journey of the Magi Summary & Analysis by T. S. Eliot

• Line-by-Line Explanation & Analysis
• Poetic Devices
• Vocabulary & References
• Form, Meter, & Rhyme Scheme
• Line-by-Line Explanations

"Journey of the Magi" is a poem by T.S. Eliot, first published in 1927 in a series of pamphlets related to Christmas. The poem was written shortly after Eliot's conversion to the Anglican faith. Accordingly, though the poem is an allegorical dramatic monologue that inhabits the voice of one the magi (the three wise men who visit the infant Jesus), it's also generally considered to be a deeply personal poem. Indeed, the magus in the poem shares Eliot's view that spiritual transformation is not a comfort, but an ongoing process—an arduous journey seemingly without end. The magus's view on the birth of Jesus—and the shift from the old ways to Christianity—is complex and ambivalent.

• Read the full text of “Journey of the Magi”

The Full Text of “Journey of the Magi”

“journey of the magi” summary, “journey of the magi” themes.

Spiritual Death and Rebirth

Line-by-line explanation & analysis of “journey of the magi”.

'A cold coming ... ... dead of winter.'

And the camels ... ... girls bringing sherbet.

Lines 11-16

Then the camel ... ... had of it.

Lines 17-20

At the end ... ... was all folly.

Lines 21-25

Then at dawn ... ... in the meadow.

Lines 26-31

Then we came ... ... might say) satisfactory.

Lines 32-36

All this was ... ... Birth or Death?

Lines 36-39

There was a ... ... Death, our death.

Lines 40-43

We returned to ... ... of another death.

“Journey of the Magi” Symbols

Biblical Imagery

• Line 23: “running stream”
• Line 24: “three trees on the low sky”
• Line 25: “an old white horse”
• Line 26: “vine-leaves”
• Line 27: “pieces of silver”
• Line 28: “empty wine-skins”

“Journey of the Magi” Poetic Devices & Figurative Language

Alliteration.

• Line 1: “cold coming”
• Line 4: “ways,” “deep,” “weather”
• Line 5: “dead,” “winter”
• Line 9: “summer,” “slopes”
• Line 10: “silken”
• Line 11: “camel,” “cursing”
• Line 12: “wanting,” “women”
• Line 18: “Sleeping,” “snatches”
• Line 19: “singing,” “saying”
• Line 20: “That this”
• Line 21: “dawn,” “down,” “valley”
• Line 22: “snow,” “smelling,” “vegetation”
• Line 27: “Six,” “door dicing,” “silver”
• Line 31: “say) satisfactory.”
• Line 35: “were we,” “way”
• Line 37: “doubt,” “death”
• Line 38: “But,” “different,” “Birth”
• Line 39: “bitter,” “Death,” “death”
• Line 42: “gods”
• Line 43: “glad”
• Lines 1-5: “'A cold coming we had of it, / Just the worst time of the year / For a journey, and such a long journey: / The ways deep and the weather sharp, / The very dead of winter.'”
• Lines 17-20: “At the end we preferred to travel all night, / Sleeping in snatches, / With the voices singing in our ears, saying / That this was all folly.”
• Line 4: “The,” “the weather”
• Line 5: “The very dead”
• Line 6: “And,” “camels,” “sore,” “refractory”
• Line 9: “The summer palaces,” “the terraces”
• Line 10: “the silken,” “bringing sherbet”
• Line 11: “Then,” “men,” “grumbling”
• Line 12: “running,” “liquor,” “women”
• Line 13: “n,” “ight-fires”
• Line 15: “high prices”
• Line 16: “time”
• Line 18: “Sleeping in”
• Line 19: “With,” “singing in,” “saying”
• Line 20: “this,” “all folly”
• Line 22: “below,” “snow,” “smelling,” “vegetation”
• Line 23: “stream,” “beating”
• Line 24: “three trees,” “low”
• Line 25: “And an,” “ old,” “meadow”
• Line 26: “vine”
• Line 27: “dicing”
• Line 28: “wine”
• Line 29: “no information,” “so”
• Line 30: “too soon”
• Line 31: “place,” “you,” “say”
• Line 41: “ease”
• Line 42: “people”
• Line 3: “journey, and”
• Line 6: “galled, sore-footed, refractory”
• Line 9: “slopes, the”
• Line 12: “away, and”
• Line 13: “out, and”
• Line 19: “ears, saying”
• Line 22: “Wet, below,” “line, smelling”
• Line 29: “information, and”
• Line 30: “evening, not”
• Line 31: “place; it”
• Line 32: “ago, I”
• Line 33: “again, but”
• Line 35: “This: were”
• Line 36: “Death? There”
• Line 37: “doubt. I”
• Line 38: “different; this”
• Line 39: “us, like Death, our”
• Line 40: “places, these”
• Line 41: “here, in”
• Line 2: “Just,” “ worst”
• Line 4: “ways deep,” “the weather sharp,”
• Line 7: “Lying down in,” “melting snow”
• Line 8: “There were,” “ times ,” “we regretted”
• Lines 9-10: “The summer palaces on slopes, the terraces, / And the silken girls bringing sherbet.”
• Lines 11-12: “Then the camel men cursing and grumbling / and running away, and wanting their liquor and women,”
• Line 13: “night,” “-fires,” “out,” “shelters”
• Line 14: “cities hostile,” “towns”
• Line 15: “villages dirty ,” “high,” “ prices”
• Line 16: “hard,” “had”
• Line 17: “travel all”
• Line 18: “Sleeping in snatches”
• Line 19: “With the voices singing,” “our ears, saying”
• Line 20: “That this was all folly”
• Lines 21-25: “Then at dawn we came down to a temperate valley, / Wet, below the snow line, smelling of vegetation; / With a running stream and a water-mill beating the darkness, / And three trees on the low sky, / And an old white horse galloped away in the meadow.”
• Line 32: “All,” “long”
• Lines 33-35: “set down / This set down / This”
• Line 35: “were we led all,” “way”
• Line 37: “evidence,” “doubt,” “death”
• Line 38: “different,” “Birth”
• Line 39: “Hard,” “bitter,” “Death,” “death”
• Line 42: “alien people,” “gods”
• Line 43: “glad,” “death”

Polysyndeton

• Line 11: “and”
• Line 12: “and,” “and,” “and”
• Line 13: “And,” “and”
• Line 14: “And,” “and”
• Line 15: “And,” “and”
• Line 23: “and”
• Line 24: “And”
• Line 25: “And”
• Line 3: “journey,” “journey”
• Line 36: “Birth or Death,” “Birth”
• Line 37: “ birth and death,”
• Line 38: “Birth”
• Line 39: “ Death, our death”
• Line 43: “death”

Rhetorical Question

• Lines 35-36: “were we led all that way for / Birth or Death?”
• Lines 4-5: “The ways deep and the weather sharp, / The very dead of winter.'”
• Lines 11-16: “Then the camel men cursing and grumbling / and running away, and wanting their liquor and women, / And the night-fires going out, and the lack of shelters, / And the cities hostile and the towns unfriendly / And the villages dirty and charging high prices: / A hard time we had of it.”
• Line 22: “Wet, below the snow line, smelling of vegetation;”
• Lines 24-25: “And three trees on the low sky, / And an old white horse galloped away in the meadow.”

“Journey of the Magi” Vocabulary

Select any word below to get its definition in the context of the poem. The words are listed in the order in which they appear in the poem.

• The Old Dispensation
• (Location in poem: )

Form, Meter, & Rhyme Scheme of “Journey of the Magi”

Rhyme scheme, “journey of the magi” speaker, “journey of the magi” setting, literary and historical context of “journey of the magi”, more “journey of the magi” resources, external resources.

Eliot's Reading — The poem read by its author. 

Lancelot Andrewes's Sermon — The 1622 Christmas sermon of the British bishop Lancelot Andrewes, which Eliot adapted for the poem's opening. 

A Documentary on the Poet — A BBC production about Eliot's life and work. 

Eliot and Christianity — An article exploring Eliot's relationship with his religion.

More Poems and Eliot's Biography — A valuable resource on Eliot's life and work from the Poetry Foundation.  

LitCharts on Other Poems by T. S. Eliot

Four Quartets: Burnt Norton

La Figlia Che Piange

Morning at the Window

Portrait of a Lady

Rhapsody on a Windy Night

The Hollow Men

The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock

The Waste Land

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Journey Of The Magi

By t. s. eliot.

'A cold coming we had of it, Just the worst time of the year For a journey, and such a journey: The ways deep and the weather sharp, The very dead of winter.' And the camels galled, sore-footed, refractory, Lying down in the melting snow. There were times we regretted The summer palaces on slopes, the terraces, And the silken girls bringing sherbet.

Then the camel men cursing and grumbling And running away, and wanting their liquor and women, And the night-fires going out, and the lack of shelters, And the cities hostile and the towns unfriendly And the villages dirty and charging high prices: A hard time we had of it. At the end we preferred to travel all night, Sleeping in snatches, With the voices singing in our ears, saying That this was all folly.

Then at dawn we came down to a temperate valley, Wet, below the snow line, smelling of vegetation; With a running stream and a water-mill beating the darkness, And three trees on the low sky, And an old white horse galloped in away in the meadow. Then we came to a tavern with vine-leaves over the lintel, Six hands at an open door dicing for pieces of silver, And feet kicking the empty wine-skins. But there was no imformation, and so we continued And arrived at evening, not a moment too soon Finding the place; it was (you may say) satisfactory.

All this was a long time ago, I remember, And I would do it again, but set down This set down This: were we led all that way for Birth or Death? There was a Birth, certainly, We had evidence and no doubt. I had seen birth and death, But had thought they were different; this Birth was Hard and bitter agony for us, like Death, our death. We returned to our places, these Kingdoms, But no longer at ease here, in the old dispensation, With an alien people clutching their gods. I should be glad of another death.

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Journey of the Magi

T. S. Eliot

“A cold coming we had of it,

Just the worst time of the year

For a journey, and such a long journey:

The ways deep and the weather sharp,

The very dead of winter.”

And the camels galled, sore-footed, refractory,

Lying down in the melting snow.

There were times we regretted

The summer palaces on slopes, the terraces,

And the silken girls bringing sherbet.

Then the camel men cursing and grumbling

And running away, and wanting their liquor and women,

And the night-fires going out, and the lack of shelters,

And the cities hostile and the towns unfriendly

And the villages dirty and charging high prices:

A hard time we had of it.

At the end we preferred to travel all night,

Sleeping in snatches,

With the voices singing in our ears, saying

That this was all folly.

Then at dawn we came down to a temperate valley,

Wet, below the snow line, smelling of vegetation;

With a running stream and a water-mill beating the darkness,

And three trees on the low sky,

And an old white horse galloped away in the meadow.

Then we came to a tavern with vine-leaves over the lintel,

Six hands at an open door dicing for pieces of silver,

And feet kicking the empty wine-skins.

But there was no information, and so we continued

And arrived at evening, not a moment too soon

Finding the place; it was (you may say) satisfactory.

All this was a long time ago, I remember,

And I would do it again, but set down

This set down

This: were we led all that way for

Birth or Death? There was a Birth, certainly,

We had evidence and no doubt. I had seen birth and death,

But had thought they were different; this Birth was

Hard and bitter agony for us, like Death, our death.

We returned to our places, these Kingdoms,

But no longer at ease here, in the old dispensation,

With an alien people clutching their gods.

I should be glad of another death.

Born in St. Louis, Missouri, the innovative Modernist poet T. S. Eliot (1888-1965) was awarded the Nobel Prize for a body of work that includes the…

1. “Journey of the Magi” is written from the point of view of one of the magi, or wise men, who travelled from their foreign kingdoms to pay homage to the infant Jesus Christ as the King of the Jews. What does this poem gain by being told in the first person, instead of in third person? What do you notice about the character as you get to know him?  

2. Because this poem is in the voice of the magus, a speaker who is clearly not a surrogate for the poet himself, we can classify this poem as a dramatic monologue poem. Other examples of dramatic monologues include “ My Last Duchess” by Robert Browning , “The Passionate Shepherd to His Love” by Christopher Marlowe and “The Nymph’s Reply to the Shepherd” by Sir Walter Ralegh . How is “Journey of the Magi” like or unlike other dramatic monologues you have read?  

3. The speaker describes the uncomfortable realities of a long journey and explains he and his travel companions were often tired, cold, thirsty and hungry. Hardship on the physical self is often depicted as necessary or beneficial to pursuing meaning for the spiritual self, as in “Ramadan” by Kazim Ali , which speaks of fasting. How would the impact of the poem change if the poet had not included these details about the difficulty of the journey? How do these details shape the portrait of the magus who speaks in this poem? Do you believe him when he says he “would do it again”? Why?  

4. An allusion is an implicit reference within a literary work to another work of literature, piece of art, person or event, which assumes common knowledge with the reader and which can, when used effectively, bring emotional associations from one work into another and, in that way, build depth. “And three trees on the low sky” is an image that alludes to the three crosses of the Crucifixion. Why does the speaker allude to the end of Jesus Christ’s life in a poem ostensibly about the beginning of his life? What other examples of allusions can you find in the poem? How do they enrich the poem? The speaker of the poem, the magus, says that he “should be glad of another death.” To whose death is he referring? Why would he be “glad”?  

5. Is this a poem of faith, or one of doubt? What evidence makes you think so? Read other poems, like “God’s Grandeur” by Gerard Manley Hopkins or “Church-Going” by Philip Larkin or “On My Tongue” by Alycia Pirmohamed , that explore the role of faith or lack of it as one way to imbue a person’s life with meaning.  

6. Liotodes are conscious understatements in literature—the opposite of hyperbole (exaggeration). When the magus witnesses the miracle of Jesus’s birth and calls it “satisfactory” is he using liotodes. Try reciting the poem as if the magus truly only finds the experience “satisfactory.” Next try reciting the poem in a manner which captures the magus’s understated sense of wonder and awe. Are there certain parts of the poem that you feel benefit from a more explicit expression of emotion, and other parts that demand a more repressed approach? What does the unevenness of the magus’s expressiveness tell us about the nature of his experience? How can you make that experience come alive for your audience?  

7. Think of a story that you know especially well: a myth, legend, fairy tale, or a story from a religion or faith to which you belong or know intimately. As T.S. Eliot does in “Journey of the Magi,” write a dramatic monologue poem from the point of view of one of the “minor” characters of the story. How does looking at the story from a new point of view change your feelings on the story? How can it change the feelings of your readers?  

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“Journey of the Magi” does not give any details of the magi’s eventual arrival into Bethlehem, or the image of the newborn Jesus. Curiously, the magus withholds that famous moment from his listeners. The story of the magi, of course, is recounted in the Gospel of Mathhew, 2:1.  

https://en.wikisource.org/wiki/Bible_ (King_James)/Matthew#2:1  

“ We Three Kings of Orient Are ” is another piece of writing—not a poem, but a song—that is written from the point of view of the magi. Written by John Henry Hopkins Jr. in 1857, who was the rector of Christ Episcopal Church in Williamsport, Pennsylvania, for a Christmas pageant in New York City. It remains a popular Christmas carol today.  

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/We_Three_Kings  

T. S. Eliot recites one of his most well-known poems, “ The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock ,” which also is considered a dramatic monologue because of its clear characterization of the speaker. 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JAO3QTU4PzY&ab_channel=tim24frames

A Short Analysis of T. S. Eliot’s ‘Journey of the Magi’

A critical reading of a classic Christmas poem – analysed by Dr Oliver Tearle

‘Journey of the Magi’ by T. S. Eliot (1888-1965) was the first of a series of poems written by the poet for his employer, the publisher Faber and Faber, composed for special booklets or greetings cards which were issued in the late 1920s and early 1930s. Eliot claimed he wrote ‘Journey of the Magi’ in 1927, on a single day, one Sunday after church.

You can read the poem here . Below we offer some notes towards an analysis of this difficult and elusive poem, with particular focus on its meaning and imagery.

‘Journey of the Magi’: background context

‘Journey of the Magi’ is told from the perspective of one of the Magi (commonly known as the ‘Three Wise Men’, though the Bible makes no mention of their number or gender) visiting the infant Christ. The poem examines the implications that the advent of Christ had for the other religions of the time, chiefly the Zoroastrianism of the Magi themselves.

Eliot converted to Christianity in 1927 , the same year he wrote ‘Journey of the Magi’, so this is an apt poem for him to have written shortly after his acceptance into the Church of England.

According to Eliot’s second wife, Valerie, he wrote the poem very quickly: ‘I had been thinking about it in church,’ he told her years later, ‘and when I got home I opened a half-bottle of Booth’s Gin, poured myself a drink, and began to write. By lunchtime, the poem, and the half-bottle of gin, were both finished.’

The title of the poem is significant, not least Eliot’s use of the word ‘Magi’: think about its very foreignness and its ambiguity (the term originally denoted Persian Zoroastrian priests, but had come to carry the more general meaning of ‘astrologers’ – or, if you like, magicians).

This foreign and alien quality is obviously related to what the poem is about: namely, one group of people becoming alienated by the coming of another group, the people who will, in time, follow the new religion of Christianity which will lead to the death of the religions the Magi, or astrologers, follow.

The Magi are like the ‘hollow men’ of Eliot’s poem of that title from two years before: together, they find they are alienated from the rest of the world, in some sort of between-existence or limbo (because the world is in a transition between their old Zoroastrian faith and the new, emerging faith of Christianity which will supersede it).

‘Journey of the Magi’: summary

The speaker, one of the Magi, talks about the difficulties encountered by the Magi during the course of their journey to see the infant Christ.

It is unconventional to focus on the details of the journey: their longing for home (and for the ‘silken girls’ bringing the sweet drink known as ‘sherbet’), their doubts about the point of the journey they’re undertaking, the unfriendly people in the villages where they stop over for the night, and so on.

Eventually, the Magi arrive at the place where the infant Christ is to be found. The poem ends with the poem’s speaker reflecting on the journey years later, saying that if he had the chance he would do it again, but he would add that we remains unsure about the precise significance of the journey and what they found when they arrived.

Was it the birth of a new world (Christianity) or the death of an old one (i.e. the Magi’s own world)? The speaker then reveals that, since he returned home following his visit to see the infant Christ, he and his peers have felt uneasy living among his people, who now seem to be ‘an alien people clutching their gods’ (in contrast to the worshippers of the newly arrived Jesus, who worship one god only, in the form of the Messiah).

The speaker ends by telling us that he is resigned to die now, glad of ‘another death’ (his own) to complement the death of his cultural and religious beliefs, which have been destroyed by his witnessing the baby Jesus.

‘Journey of the Magi’: analysis

There are several things which are odd about Eliot’s poem.

First, for a poem titled ‘Journey of the Magi’, there is no mention of the star which – the Gospels and a million children’s nativity plays tell us – guided the Magi to the spot where Christ lay in a manger.

Second, the actual nativity scene itself is elided from the narrative: the Magi travel to the place where Christ is to be found, locate it, and then suddenly the speaker of the poem is looking back on the journey years later as an old man.

Jesus himself is absent from the poem. Is this because this part of the story is familiar to us, but the Magi themselves are not – or specifically, how the Magi would have felt about seeing their deeply-held beliefs cast into doubt by this new Messiah? Yet surely one way to convince us of the impact of this new-born deity on the lives of these Persian astrologers would have been to show us how they reacted when faced with the baby Christ.

There are several possible reasons why Eliot would have chosen to leave Jesus out of the poem, but they all raise additional questions.

Note also how the imagery foreshadows Christ’s later life and crucifixion: the three trees suggesting Christ’s crucifixion, between two thieves on the mountain; the vine, to which Jesus will liken himself; the pieces of silver foreshadowing the thirty pieces of silver Judas Iscariot will receive for betraying him; the wine-skins foreshadowing the wine that Jesus would beseech his disciples to drink in memory of him at the Last Supper.

These details are significant not least because the speaker is a priest or astrologer, someone who is trained to look for significance in the things around him, to read and interpret signs as symbols or omens. But he fails to pick up on what they foreshadow; we, however, living in a Christian (or even a post-Christian) society, can read their significance. At the end, the speaker is left feeling jaded and lost by the advent of Christ: he wonders whether Christ’s birth has been a good thing, since his arrival in the world signalled the death of his religion and the religion of his people. Now, he and his fellow Magi are world-weary and welcome the end.

‘Journey of the Magi’ is partly about belonging, about social, tribal, and religious belonging: the speaker of the poem reflects sadly that the coming of Christ has rendered his own gods and his own tribe effete, displaced, destined to be overtaken by the advent of Christ – and, with him, Christianity.

It is tempting to see the poem – written in the year Eliot converted to Anglo-Catholicism – as a metaphor for Eliot’s own feelings concerning secularism and the Christian religion, Christianity having itself been rendered effete in the face of Darwin, modern physics, and secular philosophy. The poem, about a people’s conversion from one religion to another, is equally bound up with Eliot’s own conversion.

However, a more nuanced reading invites us to see the poem as an account of the ways in which every religious and ethnic identity is in some sense threatened, at some time or in some place, by other, more dominant groups and identities. A possible allusion to Othello’s ‘Set you down this’ (his dying words in Shakespeare’s play) points up the religious and ethnic differences which underlie the poem’s setting: Othello, like Eliot, had converted to Christianity, since he was a Muslim moor who converted when he joined the Christian world of Venice.

(It should be noted, though, that there is an alternative source for these lines in Eliot’s poem: in one of his sermons, Lancelot Andrewes writes, ‘Secondly, set down this’. As with many allusions in Eliot’s poetry, there are several possible sources which Eliot may be calling into play.)

The poem, then, is not just about religious identity but about broader issues of ethnic and cultural identity, too. Note how the poem doesn’t mention Christ’s name anywhere, or that the infant they are travelling to see is Jesus: it doesn’t need to be said. Then recall the foreignness of ‘Magi’ in that title.

The Magi are already ‘other’, the alien ones or outsiders: when the speaker tells us at the end that they returned to ‘our places, these Kingdoms’, it is tempting to see the poem as in some sense a development of ‘The Hollow Men’, which was also about a group of men feeling lost and empty in a ‘kingdom’ where they appear to long for death.

It is undoubtedly this multifaceted quality to the poem which helped it to become one of the nation’s favourite poems in 1996 (it was no. 44 on the list – one higher than the childhood favourite by Edward Lear, ‘The Owl and the Pussycat’ ).

‘Journey of the Magi’ is a more accessible poem than some of T. S. Eliot’s other work, yet it remains a challenging piece of poetry in many ways. It is only through analysing some of its images and more curious details that we can begin to appreciate it at a deeper level.

Continue to explore Eliot’s poetry with our analysis of his great religious poem, Ash-Wednesday , our introduction to his suite of religious poems  Four Quartets ,  and our discussion of his early modernist masterpiece, ‘The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock’ .

Image: Journey of the Magi, mosaic, Basilica Sant’Apollinare Nuovo, Ravenna, ca. 6th c. , Wikimedia Commons.

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11 thoughts on “A Short Analysis of T. S. Eliot’s ‘Journey of the Magi’”

What a fabulous analysis of one of my favourite poems. I always read it with a lump in my throat… the sense of despair at having outlived his sense of rightness about his own culture and religion always seems desperately sad to me. Thank you, also, for teasing out some of the more problematical aspects of this nuanced and layered poem:).

Thank you – very glad you found the analysis useful and of interest. The most poignant part for me has to be the speaker’s failure to see the significance of those symbols which foreshadow Jesus’ later life. He’s spent his whole life interpreting signs, and yet these point to a future which he will never know. A terrific poem :)

Yes! You’re right – and that aspect of the poem had never occurred to me before… which, as you say, just adds to the sense of sadness.

I had an LP of Modern Poets and this was one featured – possibly with John Gielgud reading it!

I bet it sounded wonderful, it is a lovely poem to read aloud…

Reblogged this on Manolis .

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Surely the lack of reference to Christ’s birth, the star etc (what you call elision) is due to the fact that Eliot wants to concentrate not on the event (which we should all know about, or can find out about) but on its effect on the Magi? I assume that’s why the title is “The journey (i.e. inner) of the Magi”

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Journey of the Magi

By t.s. eliot, journey of the magi summary and analysis of journey of the magi.

The title of the poem refers to a “journey.” This word means an act of traveling from one place to another, but also, in a metaphorical sense, the long and often difficult process of personal change and development.

" Journey of the Magi " begins with a quotation from a Christmas sermon, which establishes the initial choral voice of the poem: the Persian kings who crossed the desert in winter to honor the birth of the baby Jesus. In the quotation, the magi, speaking in a plural "we," describe how the journey was difficult for them physically, emotionally, and spiritually. This quotation leads into a longer description of the difficulties of the journey.

The second stanza begins with a new dramatic beat: The dark night of the soul has passed, and it is now the dawn of a new day, literally and spiritually. The Magi descend into the fertile Judean valley. This stanza is full of Biblical allusions. The Magi find the manger where Jesus was born.

The third stanza switches to the voice of a singular Magus, who is reminiscing about the journey. (In retrospect, this could mean that the entire poem was written from a first-person perspective, but there was no way to know that before this point). He evaluates the experience, deciding that he “would do it again,” but then wonders at the paradox that the birth of Jesus was also a death. This death refers to both the death of Christ and the death of the old religious order, including the magical power of the Magus. He ends the poem wishing for another death, which represents both suicidal despair and an anticipation of Christ’s crucifixion and resurrection, ushering in a new Christian era.

The "journey" of the title describes the literal and mythic journey of the Magi across the desert to bring gifts to Jesus, the Christian messiah. It also describes the Magi’s internal journey from pagan to Christian. The Magus acts as a persona for Eliot, who went through his own conversion from agnostic to Anglican. From his point of view as a faithful Christian, the journey also represents the drastic change that the world undergoes at the birth of Jesus Christ.

The first five lines of the poem are in quotation marks. That’s because they are quoting the Nativity Sermon by Lancelot Andrewes, the Bishop of Winchester. He was a prominent clergyman and scholar who oversaw the translation of the King James Bible. The original text was from the Christmas sermon he preached to the Jacobean court in 1622: "A cold coming they had of it at this time of the year, just the worst time of the year to take a journey, and specially a long journey. The ways deep, the weather sharp, the days short, the sun farthest off, in solsitio brumali, the very dead of winter." Eliot wrote an essay titled “Lancelot Andrewes” (Selected Essays, 1934), in which he praised Andrewes’ leadership in the Church of England and harmonious blend of intellect and emotion.

The voice is a choral “we” of the three Magi who are recalling the journey to Bethlehem they undertook to witness the birth of Jesus. The Magi would have been crossing the desert from Persia to Judea. The Magi could not be quoting Lancelot Andrewes, because they would have made the journey in the first year of the Christian calendar—much before Andrewes lived. With the first “And,” the voice of the poem enters into the imaginative persona established by the sermon and builds upon it. So there is a poetic consciousness that is beyond the Magi, an anachronistic voice that is also on a Christian journey.

The journey is a hard one, especially for kings who are used to the luxurious life of “summer palaces” and “silken girls bringing sherbet.” They travel a long ways in wintertime through snow on the backs of uncooperative camels, with unhappy handlers. Both the Magi and their servants are going through withdrawals from a sensuous life of earthly comforts. They are cold and homeless and alien to the communities they pass through. In this way their journey parallels that of Mary and Joseph, who are famously denied a room at the inn, so Jesus is born in a manger. Spiritually, they are being tried, and stripped of everything familiar. They go through a dark night of the soul, literally and figuratively, with the voices of doubt discouraging them.

In the second stanza, the men enter a "temperate valley," and a shift occurs. The word “temperate” holds two meanings here: the valley is both mild and restrained. This is in contrast to the worlds described in the first stanza—both the precarious and decadent summer palaces, and the extremely cold winter in the desert. There is a supernatural and symbolic seasonal shift to spring: the valley is a fertile place, represented by water and the smell of vegetation. The running stream and water-mill also give movement to a landscape that was frozen in the last stanza. This is also a Biblical allusion: In John 4:10-14, Jesus called himself the Living Water. The stream powers a mill “beating the darkness,” alluding to Jesus’ claim in John 8:12 to be the Light of the World. The “three trees low on the sky” have been interpreted variously by scholars to refer to the crucifixion of Christ with the two thieves on crosses to either side of him, or the Trinity of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost. This is an example of both symbolism and foreshadowing. The “white horse” refers to the one in Zechariah 6:5, who announces the coming of Jesus.

The Magi arrive at a tavern with “vine-leaves over the lintel,” a Biblical allusion to both the story of Passover from Exodus 12 and the notion of Christ as the “True Vine” (John 15:1, 5). The word “lintel” is rooted in the Latin word limen, which means threshold. They are on the threshold before both the entry to Bethlehem, and the moment before Christ is born, which for the Christian faithful will change the world entirely. The "hands" and "feet" in the next two lines are synecdoches, referring to people who are gambling and kicking wineskins to call for alcohol, by the parts of their bodies that are used in these debased actions. They are also biblical allusions to the bartering for Christ (Matthew 26:14-16) and Jesus’ parable of the new wine (Matthew 9:17). The faith of the Magi continues to be tested, as they receive no information, and “arrive not a moment too soon,” which could mean that they were at the end of their tether, or that they arrive just before or after Christ was born. Then there’s the peculiar phrase “Finding the place; it was (you may say) satisfactory.” This could be interpreted as the haughty, snarky view of kings looking down upon the stable in which Christ was born. But some scholars have also seen in it a reference to Article 31 of the Anglican Articles, in which Christ's sacrifice "satisfies" the debt of all mankind’s sins.

The first line of the final stanza situates it at a later time than the other two stanzas. It frames the text as a story within a story, and makes the speaker’s tale less reliable, as it is a memory of a long-ago event. The speaker has shifted to a singular “I” who is evaluating the journey after it has past. He decides that he “would do it again,” but that’s not his final thought—there’s a comma and a “but,” a qualifier, and then the urgent plea, repeated twice, to “set down this,” which means write this down. The lines “but set down/ This set down/ This” come from speech patterns that Andrewes used in his Nativity sermons of 1616, 1622, and 1623. Then we get to the question that’s critically important to the Magus: “were we led all that way for/Birth or Death?”

He starts to think through the answer to his question with “There was a Birth, certainly, We had evidence and no doubt.” This is a rational critical consciousness, assessing the historical fact of Jesus’ birth. He relates this to his past experience with birth and death, and says that he “had thought they were different.” Indeed, birth and death are usually figured as opposites. So, we are entering the realm of paradox here, as he relays his emotional experience of Christ’s birth: “this Birth was/Hard and bitter agony for us, like Death, our death.” This experience has changed his view of the fundamental meaning of life and death, and made them synonymous. It reflects the painful paradox at the heart of Christianity: Christ was born to die.

Notice the capitalizations of Birth and Death in these lines: this is granting a deference to Christ that conveys the Magus’ and the poet’s faith. The second “death” in this line is not capitalized, as it refers to the Magi’s death. This is significant because it sets up a contrast: Christ’s “Death” is more important than the Magi’s “death.” This must refer to a metaphoric death, since the Magus speaks while he is still living. (Indeed, it is a simile). In imagining how the birth and death of Christ relates to the metaphoric death of the Magi, it’s significant to note that the word Magi also meant Sorcerers; the word comes from the same root as magic. So the birth of Christianity is also the death of the old ways of Magicians. The Magi lost their magic, their power, their relevance, and experienced a type of social death.

The Magus then returns to his story, to tell a coda of the return to their kingdoms. Remember, these were the sensual palaces they left behind to make the journey. But he has changed, and is “no longer at ease.” In Christian theology, “dispensation” means a divinely ordained system prevailing at a particular period of history. The phrase “the old dispensation” means that the divine system, the meaning of life, has changed. He then finds his own people to be “alien” as they “clutch” false idols.

The Magus is existentially exhausted and ultimately suicidal, as he ends with “I should be glad of another death”—meaning his own. In this deeply anticlimactic ending, the poem imagines the advent of Christianity as a calamity for the old world. He may also wish for death because he no longer has use for earthly pleasures, and looks forward to the kingdom of heaven. Another possible interpretation of the last line is that the Magus is speaking during the time period when Christ has been born, but has not yet died. The Magus would then be wishing for Christ’s death, and thus for his resurrection and the salvation of mankind. It's important to notice that these two possible meanings of the last line of “Journey of the Magi” are not mutually exclusive: the context of the poem is the point of view of someone with a new faith that makes his old position and world obsolete. He is waiting for his own death, along with the death and of Christ, who will be born again to redeem the world and usher in a new dispensation, a world in which the Magi themselves have no place.

Journey of the Magi Questions and Answers

The Question and Answer section for Journey of the Magi is a great resource to ask questions, find answers, and discuss the novel.

The journey of the magi

In the first two stanzas of the poem, the speaker is a choral “we” of the three Magi recalling the journey to Bethlehem they undertook to witness the birth of Jesus. In the final stanza the voice shifts to the singular “I” of a Magus who evaluates...

Discuss the theme of the life is a journey

What are the characteristics of the Magi in the poem?

The Magi are determined, unsure, and in the end transformed.

Study Guide for Journey of the Magi

Journey of the Magi study guide contains a biography of T.S. Eliot, literature essays, quiz questions, major themes, characters, and a full summary and analysis.

• About Journey of the Magi
• Journey of the Magi Summary
• Character List

Essays for Journey of the Magi

Journey of the Magi essays are academic essays for citation. These papers were written primarily by students and provide critical analysis of Journey of the Magi by T.S. Eliot.

• The Importance of Ambiguity in the Representation of Reality and Truth in "Preludes," "The Hollow Men," and "Journey of the Magi"

• Journey Of The Magi

‘A cold coming we had of it, Just the worst time of the year For a journey, and such a journey: The ways deep and the weather sharp, The very dead of winter.’ And the camels galled, sore-footed, refractory, Lying down in the melting snow. There were times we regretted The summer palaces on slopes, the terraces, And the silken girls bringing sherbet.

Then the camel men cursing and grumbling And running away, and wanting their liquor and women, And the night-fires going out, and the lack of shelters, And the cities hostile and the towns unfriendly And the villages dirty and charging high prices: A hard time we had of it. At the end we preferred to travel all night, Sleeping in snatches, With the voices singing in our ears, saying That this was all folly.

Then at dawn we came down to a temperate valley, Wet, below the snow line, smelling of vegetation; With a running stream and a water-mill beating the darkness, And three trees on the low sky, And an old white horse galloped in away in the meadow. Then we came to a tavern with vine-leaves over the lintel, Six hands at an open door dicing for pieces of silver, And feet kicking the empty wine-skins. But there was no imformation, and so we continued And arrived at evening, not a moment too soon Finding the place; it was (you may say) satisfactory.

All this was a long time ago, I remember, And I would do it again, but set down This set down This: were we led all that way for Birth or Death? There was a Birth, certainly, We had evidence and no doubt. I had seen birth and death, But had thought they were different; this Birth was Hard and bitter agony for us, like Death, our death. We returned to our places, these Kingdoms, But no longer at ease here, in the old dispensation, With an alien people clutching their gods. I should be glad of another death.

Analysis, meaning and summary of T.S. Eliot's poem Journey Of The Magi

33 comments.

this poem is fantastic but it ‘s not easy to understand it without reading it over and over again

The poem was written in the UK. T S Eliot was a British citizen who was born in the US but produced his work in the UK where he lived for most of his life.

It a wonderful poem bigup to eliot.

eliot at his best…the biblical allusions are commendable….

What I take from the sense of sadness and resignation in the narrator is that he had this experience. He made this difficult journey. He was searching for something, but when he found it, he could not bring himself to fully accept the implications. This reminds me of the ending of that Rilke poem “You must change your life”. The narrator is unwilling to do this, and because of this he cannot enjoy the reality or the fruits of a true rebirth in Christ. He remains in the liminal zone of betwixt and between, neither here nor there. Physical death would be a relief to him because he can no longer enjoy the old but neither can he truly embrace the new. To do so he would have to sacrifice the comforts of the old and the familiar and leap boldly into the new, into the arms of Christ.

throught my reading to this wonderful poem i concluded to the fact that it goes beyond two important phases that is the first one is a physical journey where the 1st stanza is describing its hardship while the rest of the poem is emphasizing the spiritual journey that appears more difficult than the 1st one..

wonderfull and deserve to be on the number one hot spot

its a very nice poem that one needs to read over and over again just like the bible that brings different meanings each time it is read

If we look at these words “I would be glad of another death” it would be easy to be lead to believe the wise visitor of the Christ Child is feeling pangs of despair. Despair however is not consistent with Christian thought. The tiny baby born in the stable at Bethlehem is the cause of our joy. “Do not be afraid” said the angels to the shepherds. Rather than despair, another death, a physical one, is the point of entry into eternal life where we look forever upon the face of Christ as the magus has seen for himself. That face which is all hope and beauty and peace for a man jaded of the things of this world. Recall another man, an elderly one, Simeon the proghet, who waited his whole life in the temple to see the face of of the redeemer. “Now you may release your servant oh Lord, for my eyes have seen your salvation.” He is glad of death because a life much greater awaits him too. Happy Epiphany 2010!

jouney of the magi is a wonderful as well as a hearttouching poem….even though it is hard 2 understand it is quite easier when understood….i wonder how the poet could bring out meaningful similies for the biblical incidents ,so succesfully…the sucess of the poet lies in bringing out words which really posess entirely different meaning from what they seem to be..

The poem is fantastic.

T S Eliot is a poet with great wealth of language and philosophy. That is why the poem cannot be understood after reading it once. I will advise readers to go over it as much as possible.

I believe it is a poem to read over and over again. It is full of picturesque imagries that sends one on mental torment.

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