For most of us, there is only the unattended
Moment, the moment in and out of time,
The distraction fit, lost in a shaft of sunlight,
The wild thyme unseen, or the winter lightning
Or the waterfall, or music heard so deeply
That it is not heard at all, but you are the music
While the music lasts.
T. S. Eliot, from “The Dry Salvages”
[Four Quartets] is in a double sense a ‘harmony of opposites’. Not merely are oppositions in the world of flux and time reconciled, but the cosmic cycles of change and succession are harmonized with the permanence of eternity, repetitions within the world process with the forward movement and ultimate consummation of history.
—E. J. Storman, “Time and Mr Eliot,” 1944
Come read and discuss one of the most ambitious, lyrically stunning, and finely wrought meditations on time, memory, and the divine! Instructor Ben Pease has been obsessed with the Four Quartets since his graduate school days when he memorized and recited the whole poem alongside Alexandra Zelman-Doring. We will cover one quartet per week, accompanied by a handful of critical texts that shed light on the musical, religious, and philosophical underpinnings of the work. Each week, students will also have the opportunity to select their favorite passages and lead a discussion on it!
Secondary Sources to be read and discussed during class:
Purasu Balakrishnan, “An Indian View of T. S. Eliot’s Four Quartets.” The American Scholar, 1991
Kevin Hart, “Eliot’s rose garden: Some phenomenology and theology in ‘Burnt Norton.’” Christianity and Literature, 2015.
Beryl Rosay McLeod, “Buddhism, T.S. Eliot and the Four Quartets.” Journal for the Study of Religion, 1992.
Thomas R. Rees, “The Orchestration of Meaning in T. S. Eliot’s Four Quartets.” The Journal of Aesthetics and Art Criticism, 1969.
David Soud, “‘The Greedy Dialectic of Time and Eternity’: Karl Barth, T. S. Eliot, and Four Quartets.” ELH, 2014
