April is the cruellest month, breedingLilacs out of the dead land, mixingMemory and desire, stirringDull roots with spring rain . . .Published in 1922, The Waste Land was the most revolutionary poem of its time, offering a devastating vision of modern civilisation which has lost none of its power as we enter a new century. Along with the other poems in this collection, 'The Waste Land' established Eliot as the most innovative modernist poet writing in English.