Thomas Stearns Eliot was an American-born British poet, playwright, literary critic, and editor. He is widely regarded as one of the twentieth century's major poets and is considered a central figure in English literature. He was awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1948 for his outstanding contribution to literature. Eliot was born in St. Louis, Missouri, in 1888 and moved to England in 1914, where he became a British citizen in 1927. He wrote some of the most influential works of modernist literature, including The Waste Land, Four Quartets, and The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock. His works are known for their exploration of themes such as alienation, despair, and the search for meaning in a world of chaos.