Edition: University Paperbacks, 1960 (Buy from Amazon)
Review number: 1022
The poetry of the past was extremely important to T.S. Eliot, and he wrote a fair amount of criticism. This is quite an early collection of essays, mainly about Elizabethan and Jacobean poetic drama. In most of them, the emphasis is on where earlier critics had gone wrong in their assessments of the significance and stature of the poets. While Eliot's writing is (unsurprisingly) insightful, this theme of re-examination and the tone in which it is carried out does make him seem very arrogant. (In the introduction to the second edition, he did say that some of his opinions had changed, without going into details about which, precisely.)
Generally, what Eliot has to say is interesting if rather academic. (Apart from anything else, there are untranslated quotations in at least three different languages.) He is particularly scathing about Gilbert Murray as a populariser of ancient literature - comparing a Greek actor speaking Euripides to an English one in his translation of Medea, he says that at least the original performer had the advantage of lines in his own language. With the concentration of the essays in general on the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, though, it is the essays on Marlowe and Jonson which are the most illuminating.
Showing posts with label T.S. Eliot. Show all posts
Showing posts with label T.S. Eliot. Show all posts
Friday, 21 December 2001
Wednesday, 17 January 2001
T.S. Eliot: The Elder Statesman (1958)
Edition: Faber & Faber, 1969 (Buy from Amazon)
Review number: 719
Eliot's final play has much the same intellectual tone as the others, and is particularly like The Confidential Clerk in tone. Its central character is a politician who has been successful without ever rising as high as he once expected himself to. Forced to retire for medical reasons, he is hounded by revelations from his past - a man who as a student he led into bad company, a singer with whom he had an affair and who was bought off by his father. These people, well enough off on their own account, are not blackmailing him for money; they want to spend their time reminding him of his guilt, of how his public image does not match the real man underneath it.
It is strange that for such a wonderful poet, Eliot wrote plays which are mostly neither particularly poetic or dramatic. They are not as allusive as the poems, but they tackle similar intellectual and philosophical issues; Eliot's preoccupations remain the same whatever the genre in which he is writing. All the plays are interesting to read, but don't impress as being likely to be gripping on stage.
Review number: 719
Eliot's final play has much the same intellectual tone as the others, and is particularly like The Confidential Clerk in tone. Its central character is a politician who has been successful without ever rising as high as he once expected himself to. Forced to retire for medical reasons, he is hounded by revelations from his past - a man who as a student he led into bad company, a singer with whom he had an affair and who was bought off by his father. These people, well enough off on their own account, are not blackmailing him for money; they want to spend their time reminding him of his guilt, of how his public image does not match the real man underneath it.
It is strange that for such a wonderful poet, Eliot wrote plays which are mostly neither particularly poetic or dramatic. They are not as allusive as the poems, but they tackle similar intellectual and philosophical issues; Eliot's preoccupations remain the same whatever the genre in which he is writing. All the plays are interesting to read, but don't impress as being likely to be gripping on stage.
T.S. Eliot: The Confidential Clerk (1958)
Edition: Faber & Faber, 1969 (Buy from Amazon)
Review number: 718
When Sir Claude Mulhammer's confidential clerk is forced to retire because of ill health, he appoints a young man to replace him. This sets in motion a plot which is reminiscent of Joe Orton, as both Sir Claude and his wife become convinced that the new clerk is his or her illegitimate child - both had affairs before their marriage. This obviously sounds like a recipe for a farce, but The Confidential Clerk is not a farce.
Like all Eliot's plays, The Confidential Clerk is about who we are under the facade meant for public consumption, when successive layers of pretence and secrets from our past (in this case, an example would be the identities of our parents) are stripped away. They look at this in an unusually philosophical way, but The Confidential Clerk is probably closest to a conventional drama than any other. It is not particularly dramatic, but it has more character differentiation than Eliot's earlier plays.
Review number: 718
When Sir Claude Mulhammer's confidential clerk is forced to retire because of ill health, he appoints a young man to replace him. This sets in motion a plot which is reminiscent of Joe Orton, as both Sir Claude and his wife become convinced that the new clerk is his or her illegitimate child - both had affairs before their marriage. This obviously sounds like a recipe for a farce, but The Confidential Clerk is not a farce.
Like all Eliot's plays, The Confidential Clerk is about who we are under the facade meant for public consumption, when successive layers of pretence and secrets from our past (in this case, an example would be the identities of our parents) are stripped away. They look at this in an unusually philosophical way, but The Confidential Clerk is probably closest to a conventional drama than any other. It is not particularly dramatic, but it has more character differentiation than Eliot's earlier plays.
T.S. Eliot: The Cocktail Party (1949)
Edition: Faber & Faber, 1969 (Buy from Amazon)
Review number: 717
Edward and Lavinia Chamberlayne are about to hold a cocktail party in their London flat when Lavinia leaves Edward; the first act has Edward meeting those of their friends that he has been unable to contact. These include a man who is a stranger to him, who promises to help him sort his life out. This man turns out to be a rather strange philosophical psychologist, and the second act takes place in his office where meetings are contrived between various of the characters, including the woman Edward was having an affair with (the partner in Lavinia's affair has gone to California to work on the script for a film).
The question behind The Cocktail Party is how much we understand other people. The psychologist plays a key role in revealing something unknown about the other characters to themselves and each other. This new knowledge plays a big part in their lives from that point on, as it sends one character to her death, and brings the Chamberlaynes back together again.
Like Eliot's other plays, much of The Cocktail Party is intellectual and dry in tone. It has some interesting things to say, though I don't think it is the kind of play I would enjoy on stage.
Review number: 717
Edward and Lavinia Chamberlayne are about to hold a cocktail party in their London flat when Lavinia leaves Edward; the first act has Edward meeting those of their friends that he has been unable to contact. These include a man who is a stranger to him, who promises to help him sort his life out. This man turns out to be a rather strange philosophical psychologist, and the second act takes place in his office where meetings are contrived between various of the characters, including the woman Edward was having an affair with (the partner in Lavinia's affair has gone to California to work on the script for a film).
The question behind The Cocktail Party is how much we understand other people. The psychologist plays a key role in revealing something unknown about the other characters to themselves and each other. This new knowledge plays a big part in their lives from that point on, as it sends one character to her death, and brings the Chamberlaynes back together again.
Like Eliot's other plays, much of The Cocktail Party is intellectual and dry in tone. It has some interesting things to say, though I don't think it is the kind of play I would enjoy on stage.
Saturday, 13 January 2001
T.S. Eliot: The Family Reunion (1939)
Edition: Faber & Faber, 1969 (Buy from Amazon)
Review number: 714
I found it a little difficult to understand exactly what The Family Reunion is about; it would probably be a lot easier to do so seeing it in the theatre. Clearly, there is a secret at the centre of the relationships of the Piper family, brought together at the ancestral home for the first time in several years. It is equally clear that hatred is the principal emotion that most of the family feel for each other, and it becomes clear that the power in the family lies not with apparently dominant mother Amy but with her sister Agatha.
That the secret is some kind of crime against family is shown by the presence of the Eumenides, traditional pursuers and tormentors of such criminals in Greek myth. They are silent, which is rather different from their usual portrayal as vociferous accusers.
Apart from being in verse, The Family Reunion reads as though it were one of the Ibsen plays about family and inherited taints - Ghosts, for example. It is rather less gripping to read and much more difficult to work out what it is about, however.
Review number: 714
I found it a little difficult to understand exactly what The Family Reunion is about; it would probably be a lot easier to do so seeing it in the theatre. Clearly, there is a secret at the centre of the relationships of the Piper family, brought together at the ancestral home for the first time in several years. It is equally clear that hatred is the principal emotion that most of the family feel for each other, and it becomes clear that the power in the family lies not with apparently dominant mother Amy but with her sister Agatha.
That the secret is some kind of crime against family is shown by the presence of the Eumenides, traditional pursuers and tormentors of such criminals in Greek myth. They are silent, which is rather different from their usual portrayal as vociferous accusers.
Apart from being in verse, The Family Reunion reads as though it were one of the Ibsen plays about family and inherited taints - Ghosts, for example. It is rather less gripping to read and much more difficult to work out what it is about, however.
Friday, 12 January 2001
T.S. Eliot: Murder in the Cathedral (1938)
Edition: Faber & Faber, 1969 (Buy from Amazon)
Review number: 713
The best known of Eliot's five plays, Murder in the Cathedral is about the killing of Thomas a Beckett in 1170 in Canterbury cathedral. Really part of the long concluded struggle between secular and religious authority, aspects of Beckett's death have conspired to make it seem more important than it really was: the dramatic way in which the murder took place; the vague connection with one of the most important developments in medieval England, the concept that not even the king was above the law; and the massive cult which developed quickly around Beckett and which survived until the Reformation.
The short play has two scenes, one about a month before the murder, when Beckett returned to Canterbury from exile in France, and the actual murder itself. As an interlude between them stands Beckett's Christmas Day sermon from that year, and the second scene also includes an interlude in which the four knights who killed Beckett plead their case to the audience. These interludes are in prose, and the rest of the play is blank verse.
Murder in the Cathedral is a very intellectual play, though apparently compelling on stage. Much of the dialogue is more like philosophy than drama, and much of the structure is related to medieval mystery and miracle plays. This is particularly apparent with the four tempters who come to Beckett in the first act, trying to persuade him (for example) to renew his friendship with the king. In no sense is Eliot attempting to be historically accurate or even convincing; in real life people would never speak the way they do in this play. Nevertheless, it is interesting to read.
Review number: 713
The best known of Eliot's five plays, Murder in the Cathedral is about the killing of Thomas a Beckett in 1170 in Canterbury cathedral. Really part of the long concluded struggle between secular and religious authority, aspects of Beckett's death have conspired to make it seem more important than it really was: the dramatic way in which the murder took place; the vague connection with one of the most important developments in medieval England, the concept that not even the king was above the law; and the massive cult which developed quickly around Beckett and which survived until the Reformation.
The short play has two scenes, one about a month before the murder, when Beckett returned to Canterbury from exile in France, and the actual murder itself. As an interlude between them stands Beckett's Christmas Day sermon from that year, and the second scene also includes an interlude in which the four knights who killed Beckett plead their case to the audience. These interludes are in prose, and the rest of the play is blank verse.
Murder in the Cathedral is a very intellectual play, though apparently compelling on stage. Much of the dialogue is more like philosophy than drama, and much of the structure is related to medieval mystery and miracle plays. This is particularly apparent with the four tempters who come to Beckett in the first act, trying to persuade him (for example) to renew his friendship with the king. In no sense is Eliot attempting to be historically accurate or even convincing; in real life people would never speak the way they do in this play. Nevertheless, it is interesting to read.
Thursday, 20 July 2000
Marsha Cooley: The Archivist (1998)
Review number: 544
Marsha Colley's first novel is an ambitious story centred around T.S. Eliot and the important women in his life, and around archivist Matthias Lane and the important women in his life. The documents in the university library archive where Matthias works include a large number of letters from Eliot to his close friend Edith Hale, covering the period from Vivienne Eliot's descent into mental illness to her death (as portrayed in the film Tom and Viv), at which point Eliot suddenly broke off contact with Hale.
The events of Eliot's life have additional resonance for Matthias because there are parallels with his own. His wife Judith was a moderately successful poet who became obsessed with the Holocaust as part of manic depression and who eventually committed suicide after living in a mental hospital for some years. The middle part of the novel is her journal of these years, preserved against her wishes as Edith Hale preserved Eliot's letters against his.
The Archivist is about Matthias and Judith principally, and about their feelings of guilt: Judith's for being an American Jew who knew nothing about the Holocaust during the War and so participated in the "it doesn't concern me" attitude which made it possible; Matthias' for his treatment of Judith, even though this seemed as good for her as possible at the time. Their mutual liking for Eliot's work, and Matthias' feelings about the way Vivienne was treated, are all part of this, which is emphasised by the way that many of the narrative chapters (as opposed to the journal section) are structured around quotations from The Four Quartets.
The Archivist has a complex, intellectual structure, yet the reader doesn't need to grasp a large amount of it to appreciate the novel. The journal section is traumatic in places and the novel as a whole ambiguous. It is an impressive début.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
Posts
