'Four Quartets 2: East Coker' by T.S. Eliot
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Four Quartets1940IIn my beginning is my end. In succession
Houses rise and fall, crumble, are extended,
Are removed, destroyed, restored, or in their place
Is an open field, or a factory, or a by-pass.
Old stone to new building, old timber to new fires,
Old fires to ashes, and ashes to the earth
Which is already flesh, fur and faeces,
Bone of man and beast, cornstalk and leaf.
Houses live and die: there is a time for building
And a time for living and for generation
And a time for the wind to break the loosened pane
And to shake the wainscot where the field-mouse trots
And to shake the tattered arras woven with a silent motto.In my beginning is my end. Now the light falls
Across the open field, leaving the deep lane
Shuttered with branches, dark in the afternoon,
Where you lean against a bank while a van passes,
And the deep lane insists on the direction
Into the village, in the electric heat
Hypnotised. In a warm haze the sultry light
Is absorbed, not refracted, by grey stone.
The dahlias sleep in the empty silence.
Wait for the early owl.In that open field
If you do not come too close, if you do not come too close,
On a summer midnight, you can hear the music
Of the weak pipe and the little drum
And see them dancing around the bonfire
The association of man and woman
In daunsinge, signifying matrimonie-
A dignified and commodiois sacrament.
Two and two, necessarye coniunction,
Holding eche other by the hand or the arm
Whiche betokeneth concorde. Round and round the fire
Leaping through the flames, or joined in circles,
Rustically solemn or in rustic laughter
Lifting heavy feet in clumsy shoes,
Earth feet, loam feet, lifted in country mirth
Mirth of those long since under earth
Nourishing the corn. Keeping time,
Keeping the rhythm in their dancing
As in their living in the living seasons
The time of the seasons and the constellations
The time of milking and the time of harvest
The time of the coupling of man and woman
And that of beasts. Feet rising and falling.
Eating and drinking. Dung and death.Dawn points, and another day
Prepares for heat and silence. Out at sea the dawn wind
Wrinkles and slides. I am here
Or there, or elsewhere. In my beginning.IIWhat is the late November doing
With the disturbance of the spring
And creatures of the summer heat,
And snowdrops writhing under feet
And hollyhocks that aim too high
Red into grey and tumble down
Late roses filled with early snow?
Thunder rolled by the rolling stars
Simulates triumphal cars
Deployed in constellated wars
Scorpion fights against the Sun
Until the Sun and Moon go down
Comets weep and Leonids fly
Hunt the heavens and the plains
Whirled in a vortex that shall bring
The world to that destructive fire
Which burns before the ice-cap reigns.That was a way of putting it-not very satisfactory:
A periphrastic study in a worn-out poetical fashion,
Leaving one still with the intolerable wrestle
With words and meanings. The poetry does not matter.
It was not (to start again) what one had expected.
What was to be the value of the long looked forward to,
Long hoped for calm, the autumnal serenity
And the wisdom of age? Had they deceived us
Or deceived themselves, the quiet-voiced elders,
Bequeathing us merely a receipt for deceit?
The serenity only a deliberate hebetude,
The wisdom only the knowledge of dead secrets
Useless in the darkness into which they peered
Or from which they turned their eyes. There is, it seems to us,
At best, only a limited value
In the knowledge derived from experience.
The knowledge imposes a pattern, and falsifies,
For the pattern is new in every moment
And every moment is a new and shocking
Valuation of all we have been. We are only undeceived
Of that which, deceiving, could no longer harm.
In the middle, not only in the middle of the way
But all the way, in a dark wood, in a bramble,
On the edge of a grimpen, where is no secure foothold,
And menaced by monsters, fancy lights,
Risking enchantment. Do not let me hear
Of the wisdom of old men, but rather of their folly,
Their fear of fear and frenzy, their fear of possession,
Of belonging to another, or to others, or to God.
The only wisdom we can hope to acquire
Is the wisdom of humility: humility is endless.The houses are all gone under the sea.The dancers are all gone under the hill.IIIO dark dark dark. They all go into the dark,
The vacant interstellar spaces, the vacant into the vacant,
The captains, merchant bankers, eminent men of letters,
The generous patrons of art, the statesmen and the rulers,
Distinguished civil servants, chairmen of many committees,
Industrial lords and petty contractors, all go into the dark,
And dark the Sun and Moon, and the Almanach de Gotha
And the Stock Exchange Gazette, the Directory of Directors,
And cold the sense and lost the motive of action.
And we all go with them, into the silent funeral,
Nobody's funeral, for there is no one to bury.
I said to my soul, be still, and let the dark come upon you
Which shall be the darkness of God. As, in a theatre,
The lights are extinguished, for the scene to be changed
With a hollow rumble of wings, with a movement of darkness on darkness,
And we know that the hills and the trees, the distant panorama
And the bold imposing façade are all being rolled away-
Or as, when an underground train, in the tube, stops too long between stations
And the conversation rises and slowly fades into silence
And you see behind every face the mental emptiness deepen
Leaving only the growing terror of nothing to think about;
Or when, under ether, the mind is conscious but conscious of nothing-
I said to my soul, be still, and wait without hope
For hope would be hope for the wrong thing; wait without love,
For love would be love of the wrong thing; there is yet faith
But the faith and the love and the hope are all in the waiting.
Wait without thought, for you are not ready for thought:
So the darkness shall be the light, and the stillness the dancing.
Whisper of running streams, and winter lightning.
The wild thyme unseen and the wild strawberry,
The laughter in the garden, echoed ecstasy
Not lost, but requiring, pointing to the agony
Of death and birth.You say I am repeating
Something I have said before. I shall say it again.
Shall I say it again? In order to arrive there,
To arrive where you are, to get from where you are not,You must go by a way wherein there is no ecstasy.
In order to arrive at what you do not knowYou must go by a way which is the way of ignorance.
In order to possess what you do not possessYou must go by the way of dispossession.
In order to arrive at what you are notYou must go through the way in which you are not.
And what you do not know is the only thing you know
And what you own is what you do not own
And where you are is where you are not.IVThe wounded surgeon plies the steel
That questions the distempered part;
Beneath the bleeding hands we feel
The sharp compassion of the healer's art
Resolving the enigma of the fever chart.Our only health is the disease
If we obey the dying nurse
Whose constant care is not to please
But to remind of our, and Adam's curse,
And that, to be restored, our sickness must grow worse.The whole earth is our hospital
Endowed by the ruined millionaire,
Wherein, if we do well, we shall
Die of the absolute paternal care
That will not leave us, but prevents us everywhere.The chill ascends from feet to knees,
The fever sings in mental wires.
If to be warmed, then I must freeze
And quake in frigid purgatorial fires
Of which the flame is roses, and the smoke is briars.The dripping blood our only drink,
The bloody flesh our only food:
In spite of which we like to think
That we are sound, substantial flesh and blood-
Again, in spite of that, we call this Friday good.VSo here I am, in the middle way, having had twenty years-
Twenty years largely wasted, the years of
Editor 1 Interpretation
Four Quartets 2: East Coker - T.S. Eliot
"In my beginning is my end."
The second of the Four Quartets, East Coker, is a masterpiece in poetic form that delves deep into the themes of time, memory, and existence. Written by T.S. Eliot in 1940, it is a reflection on his ancestral roots in the small village of East Coker in Somerset, England, and a meditation on the cyclical nature of life and death. In this literary criticism and interpretation, we will explore the various elements of the poem, its imagery, symbolism, and language, and the way they work together to create a profound and timeless work of art.
The Structure of East Coker
The poem is divided into five sections, each consisting of ten stanzas of five lines each. The structure of the poem is based on the five elements of the Chinese cosmology: earth, water, fire, air, and ether. Each section is a meditation on one of these elements, and the poem as a whole can be seen as a journey through the natural world and the human experience. The structure also reflects the cyclical nature of time and the idea of a "wheel of birth and death" that runs throughout the poem.
The Theme of Time
Time is one of the central themes of the poem, and Eliot explores it in all its complexity. The opening lines of the poem set the tone for this exploration:
"In my beginning is my end. In succession Houses rise and fall, crumble, are extended, Are removed, destroyed, restored, or in their place Is an open field, or a factory, or a by-pass."
Here, Eliot is suggesting that the beginning and end of life are the same, and that time is a cyclical process of birth, death, and rebirth. He also highlights the transience of human existence and the impermanence of the things we create. The image of houses rising and falling, and being replaced by factories or by-passes, is a metaphor for the constant change and flux of the natural world.
The Importance of Memory
Memory is another important theme of the poem, and Eliot presents it as a way of connecting with the past and the ancestral roots that shape our identity. The poem is full of references to Eliot's own past, and to the history and mythology of England. In the second stanza, for example, he writes:
"In the vacant places We will build with new bricks There is a time for every purpose, and every purpose is timely For the rebuilding of the house that has been dismantled"
Here, he is suggesting that the past can be rebuilt and reimagined, and that memory is a way of connecting with the ancestral roots that shape our identity. He also uses the image of the house as a metaphor for the self, and suggests that memory is a way of rebuilding ourselves in the face of the constant change and flux of the natural world.
The Language of East Coker
The language of East Coker is rich, complex, and full of imagery and symbolism. Eliot draws on a wide range of sources, from the Bible and Shakespeare to the Tao Te Ching and Dante's Divine Comedy. The language is often ambiguous and allusive, and requires careful reading and interpretation.
One of the most striking features of the poem is its use of repetition and echo. The phrase "In my beginning is my end" is repeated several times throughout the poem, and there are many other instances where words and phrases are repeated, sometimes with slight variations. This creates a sense of rhythm and pattern, and reinforces the cyclical nature of time that is the central theme of the poem.
The Imagery of East Coker
The imagery of East Coker is rich and varied, and draws on a wide range of sources. Eliot uses images from nature, from mythology and religion, and from his own personal experience to create a vivid and evocative picture of the world. One of the most striking images in the poem is the image of the "wheel of birth and death" that runs throughout the poem. This image evokes the cyclical nature of time, and suggests that life and death are part of a larger pattern that is beyond our control.
The Symbolism of East Coker
The symbolism of East Coker is also complex and allusive. Eliot draws on a wide range of symbols, including the rose, the serpent, the tree, and the stone. These symbols are often ambiguous and open to interpretation, and require careful analysis to fully understand their meaning. One of the most important symbols in the poem is the image of the rose, which represents the beauty and fragility of life, but also its transience and impermanence.
Conclusion
In conclusion, East Coker is a masterpiece of poetic form that explores the themes of time, memory, and existence. Eliot's use of language, imagery, and symbolism is rich and complex, and requires careful reading and interpretation. The poem is a meditation on the cyclical nature of life and death, and suggests that the past is a source of strength and identity that can be rebuilt and reimagined in the face of the constant change and flux of the natural world. It is a profound and timeless work of art that continues to resonate with readers today.
Editor 2 Analysis and Explanation
Four Quartets 2: East Coker - A Masterpiece of T.S. Eliot
T.S. Eliot, one of the most celebrated poets of the 20th century, wrote Four Quartets, a series of four poems, between 1935 and 1942. The second poem in the series, East Coker, is a masterpiece that explores the themes of time, memory, and the cyclical nature of life. In this 2000-word analysis, we will delve deep into the poem and explore its various aspects.
The poem is named after the village of East Coker in Somerset, England, which is the ancestral home of Eliot's family. The poem is divided into five sections, each of which explores a different aspect of the themes mentioned above.
Section I
The first section of the poem sets the tone for the rest of the poem. Eliot begins by describing the landscape of East Coker, which is a rural area with fields, trees, and a church. He then goes on to talk about the cyclical nature of life, stating that "In my beginning is my end." This line is a reference to the idea that life is a cycle, and that everything that begins must eventually end.
Eliot then goes on to talk about the importance of memory, stating that "The only wisdom we can hope to acquire / Is the wisdom of humility: humility is endless." This line suggests that humility is the key to acquiring wisdom, and that memory is an important part of this process. Eliot also suggests that memory is a way of connecting with the past, stating that "In order to arrive at what you do not know / You must go by a way which is the way of ignorance."
Section II
The second section of the poem explores the theme of time. Eliot begins by stating that "Time present and time past / Are both perhaps present in time future." This line suggests that time is not linear, but rather cyclical, and that the past and the present are connected to the future.
Eliot then goes on to talk about the importance of the present moment, stating that "For most of us, there is only the unattended / Moment, the moment in and out of time." This line suggests that the present moment is the only moment that truly matters, and that we should pay attention to it.
Section III
The third section of the poem explores the theme of death. Eliot begins by stating that "The wounded surgeon plies the steel / That questions the distempered part." This line suggests that death is like a surgeon who is trying to heal a sick patient.
Eliot then goes on to talk about the importance of accepting death, stating that "The only hope, or else despair / Lies in the choice of pyre or pyre." This line suggests that we have a choice in how we approach death, and that we can either accept it or despair.
Section IV
The fourth section of the poem explores the theme of rebirth. Eliot begins by stating that "The dripping blood our only drink, / The bloody flesh our only food." This line suggests that rebirth is a painful process, and that we must be willing to sacrifice in order to be reborn.
Eliot then goes on to talk about the importance of letting go of the past, stating that "We must be still and still moving / Into another intensity / For a further union, a deeper communion." This line suggests that we must let go of the past in order to move forward and be reborn.
Section V
The fifth and final section of the poem explores the theme of redemption. Eliot begins by stating that "In my end is my beginning." This line is a reference to the cyclical nature of life, and suggests that redemption is possible even in the face of death.
Eliot then goes on to talk about the importance of faith, stating that "The only hope, or else despair / Lies in the choice of pyre or pyre." This line suggests that faith is the key to redemption, and that we must choose to have faith in order to be redeemed.
Conclusion
In conclusion, Four Quartets 2: East Coker is a masterpiece of T.S. Eliot that explores the themes of time, memory, death, rebirth, and redemption. The poem is a meditation on the cyclical nature of life, and suggests that we must be willing to let go of the past in order to move forward and be reborn. The poem is a testament to the power of poetry to explore the deepest aspects of the human experience, and is a must-read for anyone interested in the art of poetry.
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