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--On Friday, August 10, 2001 8:21 AM -0600 Richard Seddon <[log in to unmask]>
wrote:
> They were absolutely absorbed with the world from an urban viewpoint. It
> was not that they were dismissive or perjorative of the rural but rather
> just blind. "Cousin Nancy" in fact breaks down all those rural > hills
but as a visitor not an inhabitant.
The opening of After Strange Gods is interesting in this regard (& in
connection with the quotation Raphael [?] posted some while back of Eliot
observing that our composure toward the Earth is related to the same toward
the Divine) although more in terms of nature and, as it were, the denatured
(dissociated?), rather than only rural-urban.
There is a McLuhan review of a book on Eliot that I just happen to have
this a.m. I like it, because not only does it show my favorite Canadian at
work, but in it even the great McLuhan shows his frustration at Eliot's
celebrated difficulty. O the humanity. There is some question in my mind
whether/how much his frustration doesn't color his remarks:
"Eliot has always insisted on the relevance of modern
anthropology to an understanding of his poetry. To
have fused the
rituals of primitive earth cults with Christian
liturgy may well emerge
to posterity as the contemporary achievement of
Eliot, as it has become
the ambition of David Jones in his Anathemata. Jones
writes
as a Catholic. But it is not certain what sense
Eliot attributes to the
central Christian doctrines."
It is a very serious uncertainty. He is speaking in particular of the
Sweeney poems. The review is in Renascence, Vol 3, Spring, 1955. A friend
who studied with McLuhan in the 60's thinks the review not to be McLuhan's
final thoughts on Eliot, but it does pose what look to me to be most
difficult questions on TSE (rather than the more superficial if
stage-hogging takes regarding TSE's supposed anti -this, -that, & -the next
thing).
Ken A.
BTW, Rick S., I might take my "solution," too, if I knew what it was. What
be that solvent?
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<font face="Courier New, Courier">--On Friday, August 10, 2001 8:21 AM
-0600 Richard Seddon <[log in to unmask]> <br>
wrote:<br>
<br>
</font><font face="Courier New, Courier" color="#993366">> They were
absolutely absorbed with the world from an urban viewpoint.
It<br>
> was not that they were dismissive or perjorative of the rural but
rather<br>
> just blind. "Cousin Nancy" in fact breaks down all
those rural > hills but as a visitor not an inhabitant.<br>
<br>
</font><font face="Courier New, Courier"> The opening of After
Strange Gods is interesting in this regard (& in connection with the
quotation Raphael [?] posted some while back of Eliot observing that our
composure toward the Earth is related to the same toward the Divine)
although more in terms of nature and, as it were, the denatured
(dissociated?), rather than only rural-urban.<br>
<br>
There is a McLuhan review of a book on Eliot that I just happen to
have this a.m. I like it, because not only does it show my favorite
Canadian at work, but in it even the great McLuhan shows his frustration
at Eliot's celebrated difficulty. O the humanity. There is some question
in my mind whether/how much his frustration doesn't color his
remarks:<br>
<x-tab> </x-tab><x-tab> </x-tab>"</font><font face="Arial, Helvetica">Eliot
has always insisted on the relevance of modern<br>
anthropology to an understanding of his poetry. To have fused the<br>
rituals of primitive earth cults with Christian liturgy may well
emerge<br>
to posterity as the contemporary achievement of Eliot, as it has
become<br>
the ambition of David Jones in his Anathemata. Jones writes<br>
as a Catholic. But it is not certain what sense Eliot attributes to
the<br>
central Christian doctrines."<br>
<br>
</font><font face="Courier New, Courier"> It is a very serious
uncertainty. He is speaking in particular of the Sweeney poems. The
review is in Renascence, Vol 3, Spring, 1955. A friend who studied with
McLuhan in the 60's thinks the review not to be McLuhan's final thoughts
on Eliot, but it does pose what look to me to be most difficult questions
on TSE (rather than the more superficial if stage-hogging takes regarding
TSE's supposed anti -this, -that, & -the next thing).<br>
<br>
Ken A.<br>
<br>
BTW, Rick S., I might take my "solution," too, if I knew what
it was. What be that solvent?<br>
</font></html>
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