Eliot uses a variety of techniques to evoke scenes, characters and moral atmosphere. Such techniques include the use of metaphor and simile to evoke feeling in what Eliot called the 'objective correlative' technique, the presence of certain recurring images, the employing of dramatic monologue as well as direct speech, the frequent use of allusion, and the creation of olfactory, aural, and tactile landscapes to compliment the visual ones. As we shall see the evocations of …showed first 75 words of 1152 total…

…showed last 75 words of 1152 total…a platter". Here, knowledge of the circumstances surrounding John the Baptist's death adds meaning to the poetry. Eliot often includes epigraphs at the beginning of his poems. These are evocative by suggesting one of the main themes of the poem. For example, in Portrait..., the inclusion of the line "and besides, the wench is dead" from The Jew of Malta add to the characterisation of the man in the poem as cruelly dismissive and detached.