Dissociation of Sensibility

The phrase Dissociation of Sensibility appeared in Eliots essay on ‘The Metaphysical Poets’. A good poetry is the result of the fusion of thought and feeling. Such fusion is called ‘Unification of Sensibility’. It is the opposite of dissociation of sensibility. Metaphysical poets have strictly followed this unification, but according to Eliot this fusion of thought and feeling characteristic had been progressively lost in the 17^th century. It is a loss from which we have never recovered. Eliot complained that the influence of Milton and Dryden caused this dissociation of sensibility. Bad poetry is the result of this dissociation of sensibility, lack of fusion between thought and feeling.

By ‘sensibility’ Eliot means a synthetic faculty which can amalgamate and unite thought and feeling, the sensuous and the intellectual. The acceptance of the Elizabethans is due to the unified sensibility that they possessed. This capacity is visible in the works of John Donne. After Donne and Herbert poets lost this power of unification, they could either think or they could feel. The 18^th century poets were intellectuals, they though hardly felt. The Romantics felt but did not think.

For Eliot if the poets of the 20^th century are willing to imitate the metaphysical poets this breach might be healed.