An excoriating review of a work that is generally deemed to be a literary masterpiece
For a fruitless foray into balderdash at its best, nothing beats Eliot’s Four Quartets which, since each is divided into five sections, should have been called Four Quintets.
The first, ‘Burnt Norton’, begs to be burnt as soon as we encounter a talking bird! The second, opening with ‘In my beginning is my end’, tempts us to ignore its meaningless middle whilst the third, by asking ‘Where is there an end of it?’ leaves us wondering is there ever will be. Finally the fourth inquires, ‘Who then devised this torment?’ and, needless to say, we know the answer!
Clearly it paid Eliot to be a partner in his own publishing house since whatever he wrote would never be rejected, except by the long-suffering reader. Perhaps the experience of trawling through this twaddle is best expressed by the poet himself. It is, indeed, an ‘intolerable wrestle with words and meanings’.
Commentaires