“We die to each other daily. What we know of other people is only our memory of the moments during which we knew them. And they have changed since then. To pretend that they and we are the same is a useful and convenient social convention which must sometimes be broken. We must also remember that at every meeting we are meeting a stranger.”

American poet, essayist and playwright

T. S. Eliot was an American poet, essayist and playwright. He was a leading figure in modernist poetry in English and won the 1948 Nobel Prize in Literature. He changed the shape of English-language verse through his style, his handling of structure, and his spare, often bleak tone. He is also known for critical essays that reassessed long-held cultural assumptions.