Science & Technology in Literature, English Poetry - 20th Century - Literary Criticism, Physics - General & Miscellaneous, 20th Century American Literature - General & Miscellaneous - Literary Criticism, Poetic Theory, 20th Century American Literature - P

Aethereal Rumours

Name: Aethereal Rumours
Author: Benjamin G. Lockerd
ISBN: 9780838753736

by Lockerd, Benjamin G.

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Overview

This study combines ideas from many different disciplines and historical periods to yield a broad and penetrating analysis of T. S. Eliot's thinking about the relation between the material and spiritual worlds. Lockerd demonstrates that Eliot developed a poetic theory based on his antidualistic belief that mind and matter are not entirely separate, a theory that emphasizes natural symbols such as the elements and the seasonsnonarbitrary symbols rooted in our physical experience. The book thus offers a forceful response to those who would see Eliot as a precursor of so-called postmodern literary theory. Instead, Lockerd finds in Eliot's poetic theory and practice an attempt to achieve what is called in Four Quartets the "impossible union / Of spheres of existence."