On Eliot

I have a feeling that I am going to be very fickle in this class. I wish this werent so, but I find thatI'm embracing both Emerson and Eliot, and I think they were in opposition of one another. Emerson embraced romanticism while Eliot rejected it for modernism, yet I do see both of them putting emphasis on the importance of the mind, and the mind's role in producing art. This is something I agreed with of Emerson's thinking in my last post. I just didnt agree with the emphasis he put on one poet being the voice of the masses, bringing true Beauty and Art to all, and I didnt agree with him that true art could be completely original and pure and divine and separate from influence of the past.

This is where I agree with Eliot. On pg. 1092 he writes that we should criticize our own minds within a work of criticism, and that we should articulate what passes through our minds when we read a book and what emotions it evokes. This seems to me to be a very grounded view of criticism, and it places much expectation on the author and his or her thought processes in criticizing poetry. He doesnt immortalize poetry as this glorious thing to be revered and worshipped. Rather, it is something to be studied and worked and analyzed and interpreted. I agree with this.

I also appreciate the attention he gives to tradition, though he does use it in an interesting way I would not have thought of. He writes on pg. 1093 that tradition must be laboured for. Just as we cannot ignore it, we cannot simply use it as immovable, historical fact. Eliot claims that literature of the past and the present contain simultaneous existence and order. This comment seems absurd at first, but then it makes sense to me. On pg. 1098, he writes that the poet must live in the present but he must also live in the present moment of the past; he must be conscious of what is already living. I get the sense that Eliot views the past as living because it influences the present. He says that the past and present are influenced by each other, not just the solidified past influencing the present. So the past cannot be a dead thing if it is influencing something, can it?

Eliot then goes on to explain how the present can influence the past. He says on pg. 1093 that the old is modified when the new is created. The ideal order of the past is modified with the new. I like this idea because I have never seen the past in this light, but I think it makes sense. Eliot is saying maybe that the present builds on the past so that works of the present become part of the past, just as the past influences those works of the present. Both periods of time are simultaneous; they are working together. For example, a present work about Gerard Manley Hopkins' poems will modify Gerard Manley Hopkins' actual poems because something is being added to those poems by this present work. Now, the poems will be seen a little differently in light of this new work. And then, of course, the new work was influenced by the actual poems. Past and Present work together.

I do have to say, though, I was unsure about Eliot's thoughts on the mind and its relationship to the man who inhibits it. He says on pg. 1095 that the mind of the poet and the man who experiences are separate things. The more separate they are, the more perfectly the mind will digest and transmute the passions which are its material. Now I know he doesnt see the mind like the romantics do, but I cant help but think he is being a bit transcendental. Does Eliot believe that emotions and feelings are separate abstractions from the man? On pg. 1098 he says that significant emotion is emotion which has its life in the poem not the history of the poet. He also says that the emotion of art is impersonal. So are we dealing with just abstractions? I know he compares these thoughts to a scientific chemical reaction, saying that "the mind is a receptacle for seizing and storing up numberless feelings, phrases, and images which remain there until all the particles which can unite to form a new compound are present together" (1096) so then I think he discounts the role of the man. I mean, I understand that the past and present work together, but what about the role of the man in the equation? Isnt the man the one who has these emotions and feelings to work into the poem?

Now I think I understand his distinction between the mature poet and the immature poet in how they use their emotions in the poems they write. Eliot writes that the mature poet can comprehend all the different combinations that can be used in the poem with his emotions, so he uses them effectively and expertly, while the immature poet just gets his emotions out in a flush without closely thinking about how to mold them into art. I just dont understand why the emotions cannot be the poet's own, but rather are compared to combustible elements outside the poet's or artist's own being.