In T.S. Eliot's The Waste Land, to whom is the dedication written, in
what language is it written, and what does the dedication mean?

boobbung --

Thomas Stearns Eliot (1888-1965) dedicated The Waste Land to fellow
poet Ezra Pound.  The words of the dedication are:
For Ezra Pound
"Il miglior fabbro" 

The dedication is in vernacular Italian and is generally translated
as:
"For Ezra Pound
The greater craftsman"

Pound and Eliot were great friends, and Pound had helped Eliot with
the editing of earlier poems, as well as with the editing of The Waste
Land. The dedication was in appreciation of that help and of their
friendship. The dedication did not appear in the first edition of the
poem, but was added in later editions.

This link to a discussion of The Waste Land, primarily intended for
high school students, contains a useful treatment of the dedication to
Pound:
Pink Monkey-The Waste Land
http://www.pinkmonkey.com/booknotes/monkeynotes/pmWasteland20.asp

This website devoted to Ezra Pound provides interesting details about
the dedication, which was a quote from the Purgatorio by the famous
Italian poet, Dante Alighieri:
 
"After he had collaborated with Eliot in what was a virtual rewriting
of The Waste Land, Eliot affixed this dedication to the poem: "For
Ezra Pound, il miglior fabbro" ("the better craftsman"). The phrase is
Dante Alighieri's tribute (through Guido) to his precursor Arnaut
Daniel, and Eliot knew it would please Pound to be cast in the role of
someone who has invented a new style. "
The Johns Hopkins Guide to Literary Theory and Criticism (halfway down
the page)
http://www.press.jhu.edu/books/hopkins_guide_to_literary_theory/ezra_pound.html

Finally, an in-depth analysis of The Waste Land has these details to
add about Pound's role in fashioning the final version of Eliot's
poem:

"Eliot’s indebtedness to Pound for cuts and revisions in The Waste
Land is well documented, primarily in the facsimile edition of The
Waste Land published by Eliot’s widow, Valerie Eliot, in 1971. Pound
cut several hundred lines, discouraged Eliot from prefacing the poem
with 'Gerontion,' and cut three short lyrics that Eliot planned as
interludes."
El Camino College-- Notes on Eliot's The Waste Land (1922)
http://www.elcamino.cc.ca.us/Faculty/sdonnell/waste_land.htm

Additional Links:

There are many websites that include discussions and analyses of The
Wasteland.  A few of them are:

University of Toronto Libraries (containing the text of the poem)
http://www.library.utoronto.ca/utel/rp/poems/wastland.html

Exploring The Waste Land (a learning resource with hyperlinks)
http://world.std.com/~raparker/exploring/thewasteland/explore.html

Links Page (Links to a variety of sites related to Eliot and The Waste
Land)
http://eliotswasteland.tripod.com/links.html


Google Search Terms:

eliot "the waste land"
eliot "the waste land" dedication
elio "the waste land" dedication pound


If any of the above information is unclear or if any of the links
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answer.

markj-ga

Nicely done.