T.S. Eliot

G.M. Höllering életrajz

by Andras Szekfu

Egy készülő hosszabb monográfiából rövidítve - Abridged from a longer Hoellering monograph "under construction".

Georg Michael Höllering (George Hoellering, Höllering György, 1897. július 20. – 1980. február 10.) a Hortobágy (1936)... more Georg Michael Höllering (George Hoellering, Höllering György, 1897. július 20. – 1980. február 10.) a Hortobágy (1936) című filmjével írta be nevét a magyar filmtörténetbe. A puszta addig nem ismert szépségű dokumentum felvételeit (operatőr: Schäffer László) egyesítette egy helybeli pásztorok és parasztok által eljátszott történettel (filmnovella: Móricz Zsigmond), és Lajtha Lászlótól rendelt hozzá népdalokból és eredeti szimfónikus tételekből összeállított filmzenét. Angliába emigrálva, mint mozitulajdonos és filmforgalmazó, ő mutatta be a hatvanas évek legjobb magyar filmjeit, Jancsó, Kovács, Kósa és mások alkotásait.

The Fate of Stupidity

by Natalie Pollard

Essays in Criticism, Summer 2012

‘Studying and stupefying are in this sense akin’, wrote Giorgio Agamben: ‘those who study are in the situation of... more ‘Studying and stupefying are in this sense akin’, wrote Giorgio Agamben: ‘those who study are in the situation of people who have received a shock and are stupefied by what has struck them, unable to grasp it and at the same time powerless to leave hold. The scholar, that is, is always “stupid”’.

What is striking about this pronouncement is stupidity’s close association with physical arrest. In everyday use, stupidity is an intellectual shortcoming, or an embarrassing lapse of understanding and rationality. But here, being conceptually ‘struck’ is powerfully corporeal. Agamben’s vocabulary for stupidity is that of the stunned body: ‘the crash’, ‘the shock’, ‘impact’, ‘struck’, ‘grasp’, ‘hold’. To think in this way is to call for etymological attentiveness: Agamben has in mind the ‘stup’ of suspended action that is provoked by wonder or awe, and is carried in ‘stupefy’, ‘stupor’, ‘stupendous’. For him, this arrest is the scholar’s permanent condition. One will ‘always’ be shocked, incited to further study, struck again. Making recourse to stupidity’s etymology, however, is itself a powerful intellectual move. Agamben’s lines might be willing to render stupid the hypothetical ‘scholar’, but not their own act of scholarship.

Focusing on twentieth century British poetry, this article examines our aesthetic fascination with being rendered stupid. From W.B Yeats’ violent historical ‘blow’ in ‘Leda and the Swan’, to T.S. Eliot’s ‘bewildering minute’ and ‘[p]aralysed force’, poets repeatedly return us to the powerful state of being struck dumb and rendered stupid. I attend to contemporary poetry which presents formal, historical, and conceptual-philosophical difficulties that take place phenomenologically, especially focusing on the work of the contemporary English poet Geoffrey Hill, in which the combination of arrested corporeality and conceptuality are key.

Whilst critical attention is often directed toward poetic ingenuity and intelligence, it seldom explores literature's attention to their disturbing, even paralysing opposites. I argue that a readerships' temptation to react negatively to being rendered stupid betrays contemporary fears about being overwhelmed, and exposed as ignorant. Arrest rudely reminds us that art is no luxury, but part of a culture’s abilities to make sense, to test existing knowledge systems, and to come up with fresher, or better ones - or to try to. We are dismayed about not ‘getting it’, especially when others do. But also: we ought to be. The violence of being rendered stupid helps us to redraw the epistemological map, to think better, or fail better. This article explores what work stupidity has done in our accounts of literary creativity, taste and reception, and the related branches of scholarship, knowledge and artistic value.

A CONTRADICTORY BACKDROP FOR C.S. LEWIS MARTYRDOM VERSUS EUGENISM

by Jacques Coulardeau

I would like to say from the very start that I will only consider The Chronicles of Narnia in their seven volumes (1950-1956), and the four BBC adaptations. So I will not consider the various cinema adaptations and the other works by C.S. Lewis (1898-1963).
The second thing I want to be very clear about is that I am not going to psychoanalyze neither the author nor The Chronicles. It would be interesting to do so from a certain point of view. This is not mine here. I will concentrate on the political and ideological model that can be found in The Chronicles.

That’s probably the best part of these novels. What looks good is not necessarily good and what looks bad is not... more That’s probably the best part of these novels. What looks good is not necessarily good and what looks bad is not necessarily bad. We have to discriminate good and bad in every one person or every one situation. The best character to represent this attitude is probably Puddleglum, the Marsh-wiggle in The Silver Chair without whom nothing would have been achieved. He systematically says the pessimistic reverse of what we would think in any situation. He is the perfect party pooper , the perfect post-modern dubitative unbeliever who yet believes there is nothing one can really believe in.
I will conclude with him and you should wonder about the meaning of his two “should” and especially “shouldn’t”:

“And I hope we’ll meet again,” added Jill.
“Not much chance of that, I should say,” replied Puddleglum. “I don’t reckon I’m very likely to see my old wigwam again either. And that Prince – he’s a nice chap – but do you think he’s very strong? Constitution ruined with living underground, I shouldn’t wonder. Looks the sort that might go off any day.”
“Puddleglum!” said Jill. “You’re a regular old humbug. You sound as doleful as a funeral and I believe you’re perfectly happy. And you talk as if you were afraid of everything, when you’re really as brave as – as a lion.”
“Now speaking of funerals,” began Puddleglum, … "

We will stop there and meditate on the meaning of funerals in Children’s literature.

Thomas Becket et Thomas Stearns Eliot ou peut-on avoir foi en l'Histoire?

by Jacques Coulardeau

Thomas Becket n’a pas été une figure historique ayant produit beaucoup d’utilisations dramatiques malgré le rôle historique que personne ne niera. Nous allons considérer les œuvres que nous avons pu consulter. Il y a d’abord et avant tout la pièce Murder in the Cathedral de T.S. Eliot (1935) ; puis le film Murder in the Cathedral de T.S. Eliot et George Hoellering (1952) et le livre contenant le scénario (screenplay) et diverses photos (notons que le film n’existe apparemment qu’en une seule copie conservée au british Film Institute mais que l’on ne peut ,pas consulter, alors que le livre est disponible, en deuxième main, en de nombreux exemplaires) ; l’adaptation lyrique en italien Assassinio nella cattedrale de Ildebrando Pieeztti pouor la Scala de Milan en 1958 disponible sur CD depuis 2003 ; l’adaptation lyrique en allemand Mord in der Kathedrale par Ildebrando Pizzetti pour Herbert von Karajan pour le Wiener Staatsoper en 1960 publié en CD en 1998 mais aussi épuisé et ne faisant pas l’objet d’une exploitation suivie de la part de Deutsche Grammaphon (disponible donc seulement en deuxième main) ; la pièce de Jean Anouilh Becket ou l’honneur de Dieu jouée pour la première fois à Paris le 8 octobre 1959 ; la traduction de cette pièce par Lucienne Hill pour le metteur en scène Peter Glenville de Broadway à New York en 1962 que je n’ai ni vue ni consultée ; l’adaptation de cette traduction pour le cinéma par Peter Glenville en 1964, film qui vient de ressortir en DVD sous une forme restaurée et enrichie le 15 mai 2007.

Cela est-il typique du théâtre « normal » ? Cela fait-il de T.S. Eliot un phénomène atypique du théâtre ? Le théâtre... more Cela est-il typique du théâtre « normal » ? Cela fait-il de T.S. Eliot un phénomène atypique du théâtre ? Le théâtre peut-il être postmoderne et fonctionner sur la multiplicité des significations construites par le public et non produites par l’auteur ? Quelle est la liberté du public qui projette sa propre situation dans sa lecture de la pièce ? Qu’est-ce qui permet à une pièce de recevoir ces apports projetés par le public ? Et Qu’est-ce qui par ailleurs l’empêche très largement chez Anouilh ou Glenville ?
Je pense que c’est d’une part l’intervention des autre tentateurs et d’autre part l’intervention finale adressée directement au public des quatre chevaliers qui font que l’on ne peut en rien réduire le sens de la mort de Thomas Becket à une seule hypothèse, tant du point de vue des motivations de Thomas Becket lui-même que de la posture d’interprétation du public. Et c’est probablement pourquoi cette pièce est devenue un classique alors que celle de Jean Anouilh n’a pas eu cet honneur et que le film de Glenville, restauré en DVD, n’est qu’un divertissement.

Por uma Historiografia do Modernismo: O Caso da Competitividade nas Literaturas Anglófonas

by Gustavo Vargas Cohen

The present text brings and comments on a series of dichotomies and conflicts that ravaged the English language... more The present text brings and comments on a series of dichotomies and conflicts that ravaged the English language modernists. The context of creation of their works is introduced
and external conflicts are highlighted, such as the world wars and their social, cultural and artistic implications, so as to reach the internal conflicts, those motivated by the anxiety and the disorientation that stemmed from that turbulent era and that generated a number of injurious observations among writers, i.e., the invectives which are the focus of this investigation. Based on oral and printed documents, this sagacious, oftentimes unhealthy, competition explored by Anglophone Modernists the likes of Virginia Woolf, Gertrude Stein, Ezra Pound, James Joyce, T. S. Eliot and William Carlos Williams, among others, is presented through the search of a balance between historical-scientific rigor and good humor.

T.S. Eliot e le radici dell’umanesimo europeo

by Luigi Walt

Published in “La Società” 62/6 (2004), pp. 781-796.

As many intellectuals of his time, the great American poet T.S. Eliot has often addressed the problem of Europe’s... more As many intellectuals of his time, the great American poet T.S. Eliot has often addressed the problem of Europe’s identity, starting from a Christian-oriented point of view (with works such as "The Idea of a Christian Society", 1939). But what can we learn today from Eliot’s suggestions? How can contribute to the current debate over European “roots” the voice of a poet, who did not hesitate to describe himself as “classicist in literature, royalist in politics, and Anglo-Catholic in religion”?

Ricoeur and the New Critical Heritage

by Sophie Vlacos

Á mörkum lausamáls. Þýðingar Sverris Hólmarssonar á ljóðum T.S. Eliots.

by Kendra Willson

Willson, Kendra.  2008. Á mörkum lausamáls.  Þýðingar Sverris Hólmarssonar á ljóðum T.S. Eliots.  [On the edge of free verse.  Sverrir Hólmarsson's [Icelandic] translations of T.S. Eliot's poems.]  Són 6: 85-96.

Modernism, Climate Change and Dystopia: An ecocritical reading of light symbology in Conrad's Heart of Darkness and Eliot's "The Waste Land"

by Geoff Berry

The Old Men and the "Sea of Masscult": T. S. Eliot, Ernest Hemingway, and Middlebrow Aesthetics

by Tom Perrin

forthcoming in American Literature 84.1 (March 2012)

This essay examines the late work of Ernest Hemingway and T. S. Eliot, both accused of having descended into... more This essay examines the late work of Ernest Hemingway and T. S. Eliot, both accused of having descended into “middlebrow” territory during the post-World-War-II years when the term was most in vogue. I argue that Eliot’s and Hemingway’s middlebrow work develops an aesthetic program that offers solutions to the contradictions and incoherencies of postwar modernism. I aim to show thereby that so-called middlebrow literature might be thought of not merely in terms of the set of structures for marketing and distribution through which it was consumed, but as having a self-conscious, counter-modernist aesthetic philosophy of its own—one that anticipates the “critical aesthetics” called for by today’s scholars.

Quick now. Here. Now. Always. L’invito al risveglio nei Four Quartets di T. S. Eliot

by Marcella Scopelliti

published in TiDiErre "Turin D@ms Review" n. 41 (Nov. 2011)

I Quartetti di T. S. Eliot vennero pubblicati, per la prima volta in unico volume, nel 1943. In
questo articolo... more I Quartetti di T. S. Eliot vennero pubblicati, per la prima volta in unico volume, nel 1943. In
questo articolo se ne propone una lettura puntuale a partire dalla dimensione mistica che
contraddistingue l’opera. La tesi è che questi poemetti “esoterici” (diretti solo a coloro che
hanno la disponibilità di intraprendere la quest verso un’esistenza autentica) non
costituiscano una mera rassicurazione di stampo religioso, bensì un invito propulsivo e
irresistibile alla vita. Hic et nunc.

"Visible Poet: T. S. Eliot and Modernist Studies"

by Matthew Hart

*American Literary History* 19.1 (2007): 174-189. Essay-review of David E. Chinitz, *T. S. Eliot and the Cultural Divide* and Charles W. Pollard, *New World Modernisms.*

"Tradition and the Postcolonial Talent: T. S. Eliot versus E. K. Brathwaite"

by Matthew Hart

Published in Elisabeth Daumer & Shyamal Bagchee, eds., *The International Reception of T. S. Eliot* (New York & London: Continuum Books, 2007), 5-24. Revised and extended version published in *Nations of Nothing But Poetry* (New York: Oxford UP, 2010), 106-141.

What is a classic according to T.S. Eliot and H.-G. Gadamer?

by Tansu Açık (Acik)

Why Poetry Matters: The Transpersonal Force of Lyric Experience in Ezra Pound's The Pisan Cantos

by Ayon Maharaj

Arizona Quarterly 66.4 (Winter 2010), 71-92.

Sovereign Ambiguity: from Hamlet to Benjamin via Eliot and Schmitt

by Pier Giuseppe Monateri

The Author examines how Romantic Ambiguity lies at the heart of the legal notion of Sovereignty, applying a law and... more The Author examines how Romantic Ambiguity lies at the heart of the legal notion of Sovereignty, applying a law and literature approach to notions developed by Benjamin and Carl Schmitt. Moving from a sophisticated analysis of literary texts, the inquiry intends to unveil the subtle strategies that lay behind the construction of Modernity and of its representational canon. The research perspective intentionally discloses the inherent dialectic between aesthetics and law. On this ground this paper rethinks the theory of the 'state of exception' as a pivotal concept for a deep understanding of Law and Politics (and their proper untraced boundaries), offering an alternative interpretation with respect to Giorgio Agamben's thought. The Author's lecture comes to rewrite even the centrality of representation as a fundamental notion both in literary and in political terms.

Didactic Drama 1:. The Message from the Christian Church

by Dawn Lewcock

This is the first section of a lecture series on Didactic Drama. It will be followed by  parts 2 and 3. Didactic Drama: Society''s Conscience and Didactic Drama:  Political Propaganda

These lectures follow the use of drama as a teaching aid by the Christian Church from Medieval times to the twentieth... more These lectures follow the use of drama as a teaching aid by the Christian Church from Medieval times to the twentieth century.
It considers liturgical drama, the mystery and morality plays and T.S.Eliot's Murder in the Cathedral.

Failure and Tradition: Coleridge/Beckett

by Paul Lawley

Published in SAMUEL BECKETT TODAY/AUJOURD'HUI 18, Rodopi, 2007.

Using a model of literary tradition derived from T. S. Eliot and mediated by J. L. Borges, this paper proposes a... more Using a model of literary tradition derived from T. S. Eliot and mediated by J. L. Borges, this paper proposes a tradition of creative failure which would enable the work of Beckett to be read through that of S. T. Coleridge, and vice-versa. Two texts by Coleridge are briefly considered in this context, and the problematic of creative failure in which they are implicated is related to key claims in Beckett’s THREE DIALOGUES. A concluding statement suggests the benefits of reading Coleridge and Beckett within the common perspective of a literary tradition, the perception of which the two writers both shape and are shaped by.

We Thought the Same of the Thoughts of the Ancients: Rooted

by J.W. Trull

Honorable Mention 2011 Gurian Writing Award

Civilization is a lie. Civilization is a lie.

The Logoclast: Nihilophany in Beckett’s and Eliot’s Endgames

by Dan Mellamphy

Forthcoming in Aaron Cheak, ed., Alchemical Traditions (Victoria AU: Numen Books, 2012).

What is proposed in this paper is that the chess-games
in the works of T.S. Eliot and Samuel Beckett are among... more What is proposed in this paper is that the chess-games
in the works of T.S. Eliot and Samuel Beckett are among the
most well-defined and clear-cut arenas these authors have found
for foregrounding a particularly problematic protagonist. And it is
proposed that Beckett and Eliot, authors often considered
at odds with each other, endeavor in their works
to come to terms with a similar problematic protagonist.
This protagonist is not the Latin ‘personam’ but rather
that which the Latin ‘personam’, the Greek ‘prosopon’
or the façade of the individual ‘person’ obscures:
a pre-personal thus impersonal quantum of force
which [1] the philosopher/Beckett-scholar Gilles Deleuze
on the one hand called ‘the fractured ‘I’ of a dissolved cogito’
or ‘the system of a dissolved self’ and [2] the philosopher/Beckett-
scholar Alain Badiou on the other hand called the funda-
mental and formative field of functions: the general,
generic and generative ‘set-up that bears witness
to the question of being’.

It was Badiou who suggested that ‘Beckett
is a disciple of Heraclitus’, and indeed
it is argued in this study that the principles at work
in Beckettian and Eliotic chess-games are at once
Heraclitean and Pythagorean. Beckett and Eliot
point us in the direction of these Pre-Platonic figures --
for instance via the Pythagorean formulations in Beckett’s
Murphy and the Heraclitean epigraphs of Eliot’s Four Quartets --
and exemplify in their respective works [i] the notion of personae
as Pythagorean ‘psephoi’ or Heraclitean ‘pesseia’ (the ‘calx’ or
‘counting‐stones’ which in a game of chess would be the
chess-game playing‐pieces), [ii] the impersonal or pre-
personal field of the Pythagorean ‘tetractys’ or Heraclitean
‘logos’ (the mathesis or ‘matrix’ which in a game of chess
would be the chess-board playing‐field), and [iii] the dynamics
‘at play’ or ‘in the play’ between the personal and the pre-personal,
between the ‘psephoi’ or ‘pesseia’ and the ‘logos’ or ‘tetractys’,
expressed as the thoroughgoing tension of that Heraclitean
‘palintonos’ or Pythagorean ‘hypotonos’ which
in a game of chess would be the movements
of the game as such: its back-and-forths,
turn after turn, round after round:
Heraclitean ‘agchibasien’).

The Heraclitean ‘logos’ and the Pythagorean ‘tetractys’
-- the ‘matrix’ of the chess-game and of the game of life:
‘aion pais esti paizon pesseuon’ -- are ‘surds’: they remain,
in the worded world, unheard (‘sourd’, in French, or ‘muet’:
mute), and are thus for the most part ‘unheeded’. To be
attuned to this mute matrix, Beckett’s ‘matrix of surds’,
is to fall out of tune with oneself and uncover in so [un]doing
the selfless or pre-individual dimension of existence
which Deleuze’s great precursor Gilbert Simondon
described as a ‘primitive magical unity’ and which
Deleuze himself, in one of his earliest essays,
likened to the mathesis universalis of the Pythagoreans.
The ‘fall’ here described, or ‘failure’ as Beckett put it, is akin to
the check-mate of chess: the ‘being crossed out’ of the
check-mated king at the crux of the chess-game
as such. To suddenly find oneself in check-mate,
and thereby to find oneself unselved, is to find oneself
not only in a negative, negated condition, but also
to find onseself -- unselved -- in a condition of
negative capability, able to perceive from this
[dis]position the impersonal condition at the heart of
Beckett’s and of Eliot’s respective works. Check-mate
(in Arabic the ‘shah mat‘: the murder, or ‘mat‘, of the king,
or ‘shah‘) allows, in the ‘thaumazéin‘ or ‘bewildering minute’
of its annihilation, an absurd perception: that of the
‘être assassiné’, as Beckett said, or of the martyr
‘Murder[ed] in the [Chess] Cathedral’, paraphrasing Eliot:
the witnessing, in other words, of an ultimately unnameable
existence at odds with existents. http://tiny.cc/krjac c/o ck/