My interpretation of "The Hollow Men" changed completely over the course of drafting my paper. At first I thought Eliot was making a statement about the emptiness of the characters in the epigraph, but I came to understand that is not what he meant at all. The characters in the epigraph were amoral men who engaged in evil but they were the anti-heroes. At least those men choose to follow a path, even though it was misguided. They believed in something so much that they forfeited their morals for something much greater (in their opinion).
The real culprit was neutrality. Those who remain in the middle and never make the choice between good and evil. Life is about chance and opportunity. Eliot is making the statement that those who do not act boldly will engender the hatred of God and the world. To never believe in something so fully that you would give your life for is a sin according to Eliot. Eliot is summoning Dante when he stated, "The hottest places in hell are reserved for those who, in time of great moral crisis, maintain their neutrality."
"The Hollow Men" is similar to "The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock" when it comes to themes of inadequacy and defeat. The characters in both poems are afraid to make a mark on the world so they chose to be inert. They are prisoners of their own fears. They will never reap the rewards of greatness without first having the courage to take the first step.
Poetry is tough to understand. There are so many possible interpretations that it makes it hard to know what the writer truly intended. It is really rewarding though when you get to the essence of what is being said. In many ways poetry requires more work than a novel but it is also more rich in meaning. I never had to write an entire paper on a single poem and that was tough, but overall it was a beneficial experience.
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