[No surviving envelope]

T. S.Eliot
EmilyHale
TS
B-11 Eliot House
16 May 1933
Dearest Lady

I returned Sunday morning from Virginia, dog-tired. It always takes me a couple of days to pull myself together after these jaunts. This was the last of my paid lectures; but I have four speaking engagements yet; and I feel too tired to begin. I wish that I had some news of you; I was worried about the neuritis, and I want to know your plans for the summer. But I have written to Mrs. Perkins to ask when I may come to see them. I have been clearing up, and putting my books ready, having been too stupid for anything else; and that has been rather depressing. I still have four or five weeks here. IEliot, Vivien (TSE's first wife, née Haigh-Wood)separation from;f1would necessitate TSE's sequestration;a8 think that in one way I shall feel better when I am actually back in England, and the suspense is over. My present intention is to find a place in the country near London for the summer; so as to keep in touch with my office without coming to town any more than is necessary.

I started to write last night, but was interrupted, late, by one of my pupils who always comes to see me when slightly intoxicated – after a Signet Strawberry Night,1 which I did not attend. SoVassar Collegeand Sweeney Agonistes;a1 my letter was unsatisfactory, and I am writing it over. I must omit much detail of last week – afterSweeney AgonistesHallie Flanagan's Vassar production;a7 windingFlanagan, Hallieher Sweeney Agonistes;a1 up my course on Saturday left for Pittsfield, and was motored from there to Vassar. On the whole I was much pleased by their performance of Sweeney Agonistes – male parts were taken by amateurs from the Community Theatre in Poughkeepsie. The two girls, Doris & Dusty, were very good, and had evidently worked hard; I was especially pleased to notice how much the actors had enjoyed themselves with the scenes. It is very strange to hear people on a stage speaking words that you have written[,] something with such associations for oneself, spoken by people who know nothing of these; very dreamlike. I had imagined realistic setting and abstract acting; they gave realistic acting and abstract setting; I was startled to see Sweeney appear in Polo costume complete with helmet & boots – Mrs. Flanagan said they needed a spot of white in the middle; but I should have done that by putting Sweeney in an apron, as he is cooking. SweeneySweeneyas pictured by TSE;a1 (who is the head of a hospital in Poughkeepsie, and who said this was the first poetry he had ever liked!) was a little tired, not so vital as he is meant to be; and the whole thing was made a little too comic; I think most of the audience took it as pure farce.2 I wish that you might have such a position as Mrs. Flanagan’s with her Experimental Theater; she can do much as she likes, I should say. The Theocritus was good; the Dorothy Parker I thought unsuited to a college girl actress; only an actress of great experience can do a long passionate monologue.

ThenEliot, Henry Ware, Jr. (TSE's brother)hosts TSE in New York;b6 I spent two nights with my brother in New York; thenAmericaVirginia;h7TSE on visiting;a3 to Charlottesville Virginia to deliver three lectures.3 IAmericaSouth, the;h3TSE's first taste of;a1 had never been in the South before. You are in another country the moment you cross the Potomac. ItEnglandDevon ('Devonshire');e5likened to American South;a1 is a fascinating country, like a sub-tropical Devonshire; flowersbirdscardinals;a8spotted near Charlottesville;a1, floweringbirdstanagers;d2spotted near Charlottesville;a1 trees, jungle, swamp, mountains, brilliant birds – cardinals, tanagers, birds golden and blue – flying about, mocking birds, log cabins whitewashed, Palladian brick architecture of Thomas Jefferson, poor whites creeping about, immobile negroes sitting on kegs or poised at street corners; people waiting for nothing to happen. A sombre, sad country, unkempt and grand; as alien in its way as California, but almost wholly without vulgarity. I should like to spend some time in the South, from Charleston to New Orleans; some day I hope I can, it does get hold of you, even in a few days.

As for the last part of your letter. It is a comfort to me that you should [have] realised what a very ‘bitter draught’ it is for me. IChristianitydivorce;b5which TSE regrets;a2 confessEliot, Vivien (TSE's first wife, née Haigh-Wood)the possibility of divorcing;f2;a4 now that I have worried a good deal, since Christmas, believing that my attitude seemed to you merely superstitious, and that the Church seemed to you monstrously bigoted. Perhaps you do feel so; or [it] might be, or might have been, harder [for] you than for me. At any rate you cannot believe that this is easy for me, or anything but a constant daily and nightly torment. I don’t want to be ‘rarified’, as you seemed to think that I was – but I do hope that some day I may have more peace, and be able to give more to others. My life here is not conducive to it; the adulation and the publicity only intensify the bitterness, so that I just hold on, praying that the cup may pass;4 but perhaps the sort of life that I shall be leading in the future will give the necessary discipline. But how do I know what sort of life it will be? Life’s irony5 may lead me into a very active public life in England, instead of the quiet retired life that I anticipate.

But O dear! I wish that you might have the sort of life which you crave, and for which your genius is fitted. I should so like you to be happy that [sic] could even forgive you for being happy – and that is a great deal!

Your letter has made me by turns very happy & proud and very miserable – but you know my faults, I hope, better than you did; and as I get to know yours better, I love them in you.

De tout mon coeur
Tom

1.The gala night of the Signet Club.

2.JoanneVassar CollegeTSE's visit remembered and reported;a2n BentleySweeney Agonistesand TSE's Vassar visit;a8n relates, in Hallie Flanagan: A Life in the American Theatre (1988), 137: ‘On the morning of May 6, Philip [Davis, a member of the Vassar faculty, later Flanagan’s husband] drove to Cambridge to pick up Eliot. On the way back they stopped at several bars. Hallie was frantic by the time they arrived [at Poughkeepsie]. “Oh, I thought you’d miss it!” she exclaimed. “I wish I had,” Eliot murmured, but he took his seat. The audience … was riveted by Sweeney.’ Vassar Miscellany News, 10 May 1933, reported TSE’s opinion of Flanagan’s production (which formed part of the programme of the Vassar Experimental Theater’s spring production): ‘Yes, Sweeney was entirely different from my previous conception of it … But I liked it very, very much. In fact, I am inclined to think that Mrs Flanagan’s way of presentation was better than my own might have been. Sweeney is still a fragment to me, I can only see it as part of a longer play, but Mrs Flanagan successfully produced it as a complete dramatic unit … The first option on the dramatic performance of the finished work will go to Mrs Flanagan.’

(TSE wrote to Edward F. D’Arma (Program Associate, The Ford Foundation) – who had played Klipstein in Flanagan’s production (‘my first and only appearance on the stage, but it was a lot of fun’), 11 June 1958: ‘I enjoyed that production of Sweeney Agonistes which was, I am sure, the world premiere. You may be interested to know that the B.B.C. have been enquiring about the possibility of a production with the same music of Quincy Porter.’)

TheAsh WednesdayTSE explains;a9n next afternoon (7 May 1933), in the same venue (Avery Hall at Vassar), TSE read some of his poetry and discussed it. Vassar Miscellany News, 10 May 1933, reported: ‘He read two sections from Ash-Wednesday, the second and the fifth. “The three white leopards of the first,” he explained, “are of course, the World, the Flesh and the Devil.” The second borrowed John Donne’s pun of “world” and “whirled”, and introduced “word” into it. It was a protest against spiritual blindness, spiritual deafness, and it made use of a refrain from the Mass for Good Friday. Ash-Wednesday celebrated Mr Eliot’s conversion to the Anglo-Catholic faith.’

FlanaganFlanagan, Hallierecalls TSE on his own poetry;a2n recalled, in her memoirs:

RoamingpoetryTSE on his own;b1n about the setting of his own play he talked about poetry with impersonal lucidity.

‘My poetry is simple and straightforward,’ he declared; and when the audience laughed he looked pained. ‘It is dubious whether the purpose of poetry is to communicate anyway. Poetry ought simply to record the fusion of a number of experiences.’ Later when asked about Sweeney Among the Nightingales, he said, ‘I’m not sure it means anything at all.’ And he went on to develop the point that a poem may be like a still life, the meaning of which we do not formulate – ‘We merely estimate the way the painter has used planes and angles.’

To student questions from the crowded house he was painstakingly exact, though sometimes cryptic.

‘Was the production what you expected?’

‘The moment expected may be unforeseen when it arrives.’ (This line he later used in Murder in the Cathedral.)

And to the student who asked why he did not write Sweeney differently, he said thoughtfully, ‘To be a different poem a poem would either have to be written by the same poet at a different time, or by a different poet at the same time.’

One questioner, referring to the lines,

Every man has to, needs to, wants to

Once in a lifetime do a girl in,

asked hopefully, ‘Mr Eliot, did you ever do a girl in?’ Mr Eliot looked apologetic and said, ‘I am not the type.’ (Dynamo, 84–5; cited in Bentley, Hallie Flanagan, 138–9.)

HisBishop, Elizabethattends the Vassar Sweeney Agonistes;a1n audienceMcCarthy, Maryattends Vassar Sweeney Agonistes production;a1n atRukeyser, Murielattends the Vassar Sweeney Agonistes;a1n the reading included the students Elizabeth Bishop, Mary McCarthy and Muriel Rukeyser.

TSE may have written to Flanagan at a later date (in a now lost letter), questioning the character of her production of Sweeney, since she subsequently wrote to him, 17 May 1933: ‘If you saw the play done against a realistic background, I have a feeling that you would be disappointed, because after all, isn’t the realistic background as obsolete as arbitrary rhyme in poetry?’ (quoted in Bentley, Hallie Flanagan, 137).

3.FromPage-Barbour Lectures, The (afterwards After Strange Gods)TSE stays in Charlottesville during;a5nAfter Strange GodsPage-Barbour Lectures, The (afterwards After Strange Gods) 8 May TSE stayed in Charlottesville as a guest of Scott Buchanan, Professor of Philosophy, and his wife. (On 12 Sept. 1946, he would tell Dorothy Pound: ‘I was very well impressed fourteen years ago by the University of Virginia, which is only a short journey from Washington. It is not only beautiful (designed by Thomas Jefferson, its founder, which would please Ez) but it was rather backward – that is to say, not being progressive, it still nourished the classics and preserved the remains of real education.’ (Beinecke).

On three successive days from 10 May he delivered the Page-Barbour lectures, under the working title ‘Tradition and Contemporary Literature’, in Madison Hall at the University of Virginia: the individual lecture titles were ‘The Meaning of Tradition’, ‘Modern Poetry’ and ‘Three Prose Writers’ – much of the last lecture being devoted to negative criticism of Thomas Hardy and D. H. Lawrence – to be published in 1934 as After Strange Gods.

4.‘But Jesus answered and said, Ye know not what ye ask. Are ye able to drink of the cup that I shall drink of, and to be baptized with the baptism that I am baptized with …’ (Matthew 20: 22). ‘Father, if thou be willing, remove this cup from me: nevertheless not my will, but thine, be done’ (Luke 22: 42).

5.Cf. Thomas Hardy, Life’s Little Ironies (1894).

America, TSE on not returning in 1915, and TSE as transatlantic cultural conduit, dependence on Europe, TSE's sense of deracination from, and the Great Depression, TSE a self-styled 'Missourian', as depicted in Henry Eliot's Rumble Murders, its national coherence questioned, its religious and educational future, versus Canadian and colonial society, where age is not antiquity, drinks Scotland's whisky, and FDR's example to England, underrates Europe's influence on England, redeemed by experience with G. I.'s, TSE nervous at readjusting to, and post-war cost of living, more alien to TSE post-war, its glories, landscape, cheap shoes, its horrors, Hollywood, climate, lack of tea, overheated trains, over-social clubs, overheating in general, perplexities of dress code, food, especially salad-dressing, New England Gothic, earthquakes, heat, the whistle of its locomotives, 'Easter holidays' not including Easter, the cut of American shirts, television, Andover, Massachusetts, EH moves to, Ann Arbor, Michigan, TSE on visiting, Augusta, Maine, EH stops in, Baltimore, Maryland, and TSE's niece, TSE engaged to lecture in, TSE on visiting, Bangor, Maine, EH visits, Bay of Fundy, EH sailing in, Bedford, Massachusetts, its Stearns connections, Boston, Massachusetts, TSE tries to recollect society there, its influence on TSE, its Museum collection remembered, inspires homesickness, TSE and EH's experience of contrasted, described by Maclagan, suspected of dissipating EH's energies, EH's loneliness in, Scripps as EH's release from, possibly conducive to TSE's spiritual development, restores TSE's health, its society, TSE's relations preponderate, TSE's happiness in, as a substitute for EH's company, TSE's celebrity in, if TSE were there in EH's company, its theatregoing public, The Times on, on Labour Day, Brunswick, Maine, TSE to lecture in, TSE on visiting, California, as imagined by TSE, TSE's wish to visit, EH suggests trip to Yosemite, swimming in the Pacific, horrifies TSE, TSE finds soulless, land of earthquakes, TSE dreads its effect on EH, Wales's resemblance to, as inferno, and Californians, surfeit of oranges and films in, TSE's delight at EH leaving, land of kidnappings, Aldous Huxley seconds TSE's horror, the lesser of two evils, Cannes reminiscent of, TSE masters dislike of, land of monstrous churches, TSE regrets EH leaving, winterless, its southern suburbs like Cape Town, land of fabricated antiquities, Cambridge, Massachusetts, TSE's student days in, socially similar to Bloomsbury, TSE lonely there but for Ada, TSE's happiness in, exhausting, EH's 'group' in, road safety in, Casco Bay, Maine, TSE remembers, Castine, Maine, EH holidays in, Cataumet, Massachusetts, EH holidays in, Chicago, Illinois, EH visits, reportedly bankrupt, TSE on, TSE takes up lectureship in, its climate, land of fabricated antiquities, Chocurua, New Hampshire, EH stays in, Concord, Massachusetts, EH's househunting in, EH moves from, Connecticut, its countryside, and Boerre, TSE's end-of-tour stay in, Dorset, Vermont, EH holidays in, and the Dorset Players, Elizabeth, New Jersey, TSE on visiting, Farmington, Connecticut, place of EH's schooling, which TSE passes by, EH holidays in, Fitzwilliam, New Hampshire, EH recuperates in, Gerrish Island, Maine, TSE revisits, Hollywood, perceived debauchery of its movies, TSE's dream of walk-on part, condemned by TSE to destruction, TSE trusts Murder will be safe from, Iowa City, Iowa, TSE invited to, Jonesport, Maine, remembered, Kittery, Maine, described, Lexington, Massachusetts, and the Stearns family home, Lyndeborough, New Hampshire, visited by EH, Madison, Wisconsin, Aurelia Bolliger hails from, Ralph Hodgson sails for, EH summers in, as conceived by TSE, who eventually visits, Maine, its coast remembered by TSE, TSE recalls swimming off, Minneapolis, on EH's 1952 itinerary, TSE lectures in, New Bedford, Massachusetts, EH's holidays in, TSE's family ties to, New England, and Unitarianism, more real to TSE than England, TSE homesick for, in TSE's holiday plans, architecturally, compared to California, and the New England conscience, TSE and EH's common inheritance, springless, TSE remembers returning from childhood holidays in, its countryside distinguished, and The Dry Salvages, New York (N.Y.C.), TSE's visits to, TSE encouraged to write play for, prospect of visiting appals TSE, as cultural influence, New York theatres, Newburyport, Maine, delights TSE, Northampton, Massachusetts, TSE on, EH settles in, TSE's 1936 visit to, autumn weather in, its spiritual atmosphere, EH moves house within, its elms, the Perkinses descend on, Aunt Irene visits, Boerre's imagined life in, TSE on hypothetical residence in, EH returns to, Peterborough, New Hampshire, visited by EH, TSE's vision of life at, Petersham, Massachusetts, EH holidays in, TSE visits with the Perkinses, EH spends birthday in, Edith Perkins gives lecture at, the Perkinses cease to visit, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, TSE on, and TSE's private Barnes Foundation tour, Independence Hall, Pittsfield, Massachusetts, surrounding countryside, Portsmouth, Maine, delights TSE, Randolph, New Hampshire, 1933 Eliot family holiday in, the Eliot siblings return to, Seattle, Washington State, EH summers in, EH's situation at, TSE prefers to California, EH repairs to post-Christmas, EH visits on 1952 tour, EH returns to, Sebasco, Maine, EH visits, South, the, TSE's first taste of, TSE's prejudices concerning, St. Louis, Missouri, TSE's childhood in, TSE's homesickness for, TSE styling himself a 'Missourian', possible destination for TSE's ashes, resting-place of TSE's parents, TSE on his return to, the Mississippi, compared to TSE's memory, TSE again revisits, TSE takes EVE to, St. Paul, Minnesota, TSE on visiting, the Furness house in, Tryon, North Carolina, EH's interest in, EH staying in, Virginia, scene of David Garnett's escapade, and the Page-Barbour Lectures, TSE on visiting, and the South, Washington, Connecticut, EH recuperates in, West Rindge, New Hampshire, EH holidays at, White Mountains, New Hampshire, possible TSE and EH excursion to, Woods Hole, Falmouth, Massachusetts, TSE and EH arrange holiday at, TSE and EH's holiday in recalled, and The Dry Salvages, TSE invited to, EH and TSE's 1947 stay in, EH learns of TSE's death at,
see also American Presidential Election
Ash Wednesday, inspired by EH, TSE recites after dinner, OM compares to Anna Livia Plurabelle, recited at Wellesley, inscribed to Scott Fitzgerald, its imperatives self-directed, TSE explains, TSE's last uncommissioned poem, St. Martin's-in-the-Fields recital, which TSE gives from pulpit, TSE cross-examined by child on, recorded for BBC,
birds, TSE reading Birds of the Countryside, American Yellow warbler ('Summer Yellowbird'), fellow passenger on the Laetitia, Baltimore Oriole, spotted in Maine, blackbird, more innocent singer than nightingale, Blue Heron, spotted in Maine, blue tits, at Pike's Farm, budgerigar, belonging to Mrs Behrens, cardinals, spotted near Charlottesville, chaffinch, at Pike's Farm, Chestnut-sided warbler, spotted in Maine, chiffchaff, more piping than the nightingale, in Shamley woods, Common whitethroat, identified in Winchester, cuckoo, compared to nightingale, as herald of spring, its song, dove, EH as TSE's, Evening grosbeak, finches, at autumntide, more piping than the nightingale, swarm at Shamley, geese, slaughtered at autumntide, hermit thrush, TSE's personal poetic bird, heron, at Shamley, House Sparrow ('English Sparrow'), fellow passenger on the Laetitia, kestrels, over the Surrey fields, lapwings, in the Surrey fields, Longbilled Marsh Wren, spotted in Maine, magpies, in the fields of Surrey, mockingbird, TSE 'the Missouri Mockingbird', and Walt Whitman, nightingale, EH addressed as, 'clanging' at Pike's Farm, and Sophocles, associated with Pike's Farm, hoped for at Herbert Read's, Pied Wagtail, on lawn at Pike's Farm, songbirds, TSE and Hodgson discuss, tanagers, spotted near Charlottesville, thrush, inspires humility in TSE, more innocent singer than the nightingale, wagtails, on the lawn at Shamley, Willow Warbler ('Willow Wren'), identified in Winchester, wren, more piping than the nightingale,
Bishop, Elizabeth, attends the Vassar Sweeney Agonistes,
Christianity, and human isolation, and modern economics, Ada on TSE's personal piety, scheme for 'Pro Fide' bookshop, among the Eliot family, and beauty, its sects like different clubs, Anglo-Catholicism, TSE's conversion to, which he dates to Eccleston Square meeting, Anglican Missal sought for EH, but unfortunately out of print, discussed at Boston Theological School, and the Petrine Claims, apostolic succession, over Roman Catholicism, as refuge from VHE, and the Reformation, asceticism, discipline, rigour, the necessity for, and TSE's daily exhortation, making and breaking habits, mastering emotions and passions, as salubrious, only remedy for a prurient culture, confession and communion, more possible during Harvard year, the case for unattainable ideals, in time of war, gets TSE up before 7 o'clock, hereditary with TSE, belief, and good poetry, faced with Second World War, and conversion, antidote to TSE's skepticism, Christendom, TSE ponders the decline of, TSE on his prominence within, its ruin, the Church Visible and Invisible, and TSE's war work, the Malabar Church, prospect of total reunion within, confession, helps to objectify sin, more dreaded than dentist, harder in the morning, death and afterlife, the struggle to prepare for, consoles TSE in life, and cremation, Requiem Mass, gives meaning to life, and what makes a desirable burial place, the nature of eternal life, divorce, unrecognised by Anglo-Catholic Church, which TSE regrets, in church law, would separate TSE from Church, evil, TSE's belief in, and moral percipience, guilt, and the New England conscience, hell, TSE's 1910 vision of, and damnation, according to TSE, liturgy, TSE's weekly minimum, Mass of the Pre-sanctified, Requiem Mass versus Mass of Good Friday, and whether to serve at Mass, Imposition of Ashes, at Christmas, High Mass over Mattins, aversion to Low Church Mattins, Roman service in Wayland, Tenebrae, in country parish church, as guest at Kelham, remarkable sermon, over Christmas, Tenebrae and Family Reunion, during Holy Week, Mass of Charles King and Martyr, love, loving one's neighbour, marriage, TSE's need for privacy within, mysticism and transcendence, interpenetration of souls, intimations of life's 'pattern', 'doubleness', arrived at through reconciliation, orthodoxy, only remedy for contemporary culture, and pagans, sets TSE at odds with modernity, necessarily trinitarian, 'Christian' defined, iniquities of liberal theology, and creed, authority, Transubstantiation, TSE disclaims 'self-centredness' in maintaining, politics, the Church and social change, how denomination maps onto, need for working-class priests, church leaders against totalitarianism and Nazism, Christianity versus Fascism and Communism, Papal Encyclical against Nazi Germany, the 'Dividend morality', Presbyterianism, TSE quips on the meanness of, Quakerism, resignation, reconciliation, peace, TSE's love allows for, 'peace that passeth all understanding', the struggle to maintain, following separation from VHE, retreat and solitude, EH at Senexet, the need for, a need increasing with age, and TSE's mother, Roman Catholicism, TSE's counter-factual denomination, Rome, sacraments, Holy Communion, marriage, sainthood, TSE's idea of, the paradoxes of, susceptible of different sins, sins, vices, faults, how to invigilate, the sense of sin, the sinner's condition, bound up with the virtues, as a way to virtue, TSE's self-appraisal, when humility shades into, when unselfishness shades into, among saints, proportionate to spiritual progress, daydreaming, despair, lust, pride, perfection-seeking pride, spiritual progress and direction, TSE's crisis of 1910–11, EH's crisis, versus automatism, TSE's sense of, towards self-knowledge, in EH's case, as personal regeneration, temptation, to action/busyness, the Church Year, Advent, Christmas, dreaded, happily over, TSE rebuked for bah-humbugging, church trumps family during, season of irreligion, thoughts of EH during, unsettling, fatiguing, in wartime, Easter preferred to, Ash Wednesday, Lent, season for meditation and reading, prompts thoughts of EH, Lady Day, Holy Week, its intensity, arduous, preserved from public engagements, exhausting but refreshing, excitingly austere, Easter, better observed than Christmas, missed through illness, Unitarianism, the Eliots' as against EH's, the prospect of spiritual revival within, as personified by TSE's grandfather, regards the Bible as literature, as against Catholicism, divides EH from TSE, and whether Jesus believed himself divine, according to Dr Perkins, in England as against America, over-dependent on preachers' personality, TSE's wish that EH convert from, outside TSE's definition of 'Christian', the issue of communion, baptism, impossibly various, virtues heavenly and capital, bound up with the vices, better reached by way of sin, charity, towards others, in Bubu, TSE's intentness on, delusions of, as against tolerance, chastity, celibacy, beneath humility, TSE lacks vocation for, faith, and doubt, hope, a duty, TSE's struggle for, humility, distinguished from humiliation, comes as relief, greatest of the virtues, propinquitous to humour, not an Eliot virtue, opposed to timidity, danger of pride in, is endless, TSE criticised for overdoing, theatre a lesson in, most difficult of the virtues, possessed by EH, possessed by EH to a fault, TSE compares himself to EH in, the paradox of, distinguished from inferiority, self-discovery teaches, possessed by Dr Perkins, patience, recommended to EH, its foundations, possessed by Uncle John, purity, distinguished from purification, temperance, with alcohol, beneath humility,
Eliot, Henry Ware, Jr. (TSE's brother), hears TSE's Dryden broadcast, as potential confidant, sibling most attuned to TSE's needs, witness to the Eliots in 1926, surprises TSE in Boston, his aura of futility, disputes New Yorker profile of TSE, at Eliot family Thanksgiving, attends second Norton lecture, his business in Chicago, hosts TSE in New York, TSE reads his second detective story, his immaturity, accuses TSE of wrath, writes TSE long critical letter, the favourite of TSE's parents, sends New York Murder clippings, writes again about religion, insensitive to European affairs, Peabody Museum employ as research associate, gives TSE pyjamas for Christmas, sends TSE luggage for Christmas, hosts Murder's Boston cast, sends present to Morley children, cables TSE on 50th birthday, given draft of Family Reunion, gives TSE portfolio, champions Kauffer's photograph of TSE, explains operation on ears, sends list of securities, takes pleasure in shouldering Margaret, undergoes serious operation, recovering at home, as curator of Eliotana, as curator of Eliotana, war imperils final reunion with, and TSE's rumoured Vatican audience, corresponds with TSE monthly, offers Tom Faber wartime refuge, nervous about TSE during Blitz, as described by Frank Morley, recalls The Dry Salvages, has appendix out, cautioned as to health, frail, condition worries TSE, as correspondent, friend to J. J. Sweeney, tries TSE's patience, reports on Ada, describes Ada's funeral, beleaguered by Margaret, sent Picture Post F&F photos, likened to Grandfather Stearns, goitre operated on, his archaeological endeavours, back in hospital, imagined in exclusively female company, ill again, as brother, has pneumonia, terminal leukaemia, prospect of his death versus Ada's, anxieties induced by deafness, writes to TSE despite illness, death, memorial service for, on EH's presumption, Michael Roberts's symptoms reminiscent of, his Chicago acquaintance, friends with Robert Lowell's father, invoked against EH, on TSE's love for EH, buried in Garrett family lot, The Rumble Murders,

3.HenryEliot, Henry Ware, Jr. (TSE's brother) Ware Eliot (1879–1947), TSE’s older brother: see Biographical Register.

Eliot, Vivien (TSE's first wife, née Haigh-Wood), takes a liking to EH, EH urged not to blame, relations with Charles Buckle, unbearable to holiday with, takes to Margaret Thorp, accompanies TSE to Poetry Bookshop, and 57 Chester Terrace, on TSE's religion, TSE declines invitations excluding, her driving, hosts various writers to tea, considers flat in Gordon Square, arranges large tea-party, as theatregoer, declares desire to make confession, taken to Eastbourne, recalls the Eliots' visit to Rodmell, Alida Monro reports on, in Alida Monro's opinion, falls out with Lucy Thayer, meets TSE for last time at solicitors, seeks TSE's whereabouts, haunts TSE in London, such that he forgoes the theatre, news of, inquires after Man Ray portrait, harries F&F office, on Mosley Albert Hall rally, dies, her funeral, Requiem Mass for, Theresa remembers, marriage to, TSE on entering into, alleged affair with Bertrand Russell, sexual relations, its morbidity, TSE on his own incapacity, its torments providential on reflection, in OM's opinion, its lessons, humiliating, TSE's father's reaction, unrecognised by TSE, to outsiders, TSE reflects on, painful yet stimulating, as an act of self-rupture, drug habits, sleeping draughts, in TSE's absence, 1926 bromidia delusions, mental state, childlike, benefits from active social life, compared to EH's mother's, at the Malmaison sanatorium, and dining in public, TSE's influence on, post-separation, the prospect of institutionalising, prompts institutionalisation crisis-meeting, and TSE's departure for America, against TSE going, adjusting to the prospect, might coordinate with a return to Malmaison, in denial as to, threatens to come, from which TSE tries to dissuade her, aggrieved at being left, possible arrangements in TSE's absence, still in denial as to, TSE dreads scene of departure, possibly beneficial to VHE, TSE describes the moment of departure, separation from, TSE, for and against, out of the question, obstructed by self-deception and responsibility, reasons for not having happened, Dr Miller's opinion on, contemplated, plotted, would necessitate TSE's sequestration, TSE encouraged in his determination, Alida Monro independently suggests, communication with solicitors on, TSE describes going through with, VHE's response before and after meeting at solicitors, impasse over financial settlement, which VHE misrepresents to friends, VHE in denial over, separation deed drawn up, which is yet unsigned, delayed by death of lawyer, general impasse, financial settlement put into force, complicated by VHE renewing lease on flat, efforts to retrieve TSE's property, which is eventually recovered, financial consequences, the possibility of divorcing, TSE's objections to, against what TSE symbolises, likened to Newman's conversion, in common and canon law, in Ada's opinion, how TSE's attitude might seem, would involve permanent division from Church, inimical to future TSE's happiness, her death, and Theresa on TSE remarrying, TSE's shifting response to, formerly wished for, EH reflects on,
see also Eliots, the T. S.
England, TSE as transatlantic cultural conduit for, discomforts of its larger houses, and Henry James, at times unreal, TSE's patriotic homesickness for, which is not a repudiation of America, TSE's want of relations in, encourages superiority in Americans familiar with, reposeful, natural ally of France, compared to Wales, much more intimate with Europe than America, TSE on his 'exile' in, undone by 'Dividend morality', in wartime, war binds TSE to, post-war, post-war privations, the English, initially strange to TSE, contortions of upward mobility, comparatively rooted as a people, TSE more comfortable distinguishing, the two kinds of duke, TSE's vision of wealthy provincials, its Tories, more blunt than Americans, as congregants, considered racially superior, a relief from the Scottish, don't talk in poetry, compared to the Irish, English countryside, around Hindhead, distinguished, the West Country, compared to New England's, fen country, in primrose season, the English weather, cursed by Joyce, suits mistiness, preferred to America's, distinguished for America's by repose, relaxes TSE, not rainy enough, English traditions, Derby Day, Order of Merit, shooting, Varsity Cricket Match, TSE's dislike of talking cricket, rugby match enthralls, the death of George V, knighthood, the English language, Adlestrop, Gloucestershire, visited by EH and TSE, Amberley, West Sussex, ruined castle at, Arundel, West Sussex, TSE's guide to, Bath, Somerset, TSE 'ravished' by, EH visits, Bemerton, Wiltshire, visited on Herbert pilgrimage, Blockley, Gloucestershire, tea at the Crown, Bosham, West Sussex, EH introduced to, Bridport, Dorset, Tandys settled near, Burford, Oxfordshire, EH staying in, too hallowed to revisit, Burnt Norton, Gloucestershire, TSE remembers visiting, and the Cotswolds, its imagined fate, Cambridge, Cambridgeshire, less oppressive than Oxford, TSE's vision of life in, possible refuge during Blitz, Charlbury, Oxfordshire, visited by EH and TSE, Chester, Cheshire, TSE's plans in, TSE on, Chichester, West Sussex, the Perkinses encouraged to visit, EH celebrates birthday in, TSE's guide to, 'The Church and the Artist', TSE gives EH ring in, Chipping Campden, Gloucestershire, Perkinses take house at, shockingly remote, TSE's first weekend at, likened to Florence, TSE jealous of memories associated with, its Arts & Crafts associations, its attractions to Dr Perkins, forever associated with TSE and EH, sound of the Angelus, without EH, treasured in TSE's memory, excursions from, EH on 'our' garden at, Stamford House passes into new hands, EH's fleeting return to, Cornwall, TSE's visit to, compared to North Devon, Cotswolds, sacred in TSE's memory, Derbyshire, as seen from Swanwick, Devon ('Devonshire'), likened to American South, the Eliots pre-Somerset home, its scenery, Dorset, highly civilised, TSE feels at home in, TSE's Tandy weekend in, Durham, TSE's visit to, East Anglia, its churches, TSE now feels at home in, East Coker, Somerset, visited by Uncle Chris and Abby, TSE conceives desire to visit, reasons for visiting, described, visited again, and the Shamley Cokers, now within Father Underhill's diocese, photographs of, Finchampstead, Berkshire, visited by TSE and EH, specifically the Queen's Head, Framlingham, Suffolk, visited, Garsington, Oxfordshire, recalled, Glastonbury, Somerset, Gloucester, Gloucestershire, Gloucestershire, highly civilised, its beautiful edge, its countryside associated with EH, TSE at home in, its domestic architecture, Hadsleigh, Suffolk, visited, Hampshire, journey through, TSE's New Forest holiday, Hereford, highly civilised, Hull, Yorkshire, and 'Literature and the Modern World', Ilfracombe, Devon, and the Field Marshal, hideous, Knole Park, Kent, Lavenham, Suffolk, visited, Leeds, Yorkshire, TSE lectures in, touring Murder opens in, the Dobrées visited in, home to EVE's family, Lincoln, Lincolnshire, TSE's visit to, especially the Bishop's Palace, Lincolnshire, arouses TSE's curiosity, unknown to EH, Lingfield, Surrey, Little Gidding, Cambridgeshire, TSE's long-intended expedition to, London, in TSE's experience, TSE's isolation within, affords solitude and anonymity, contrasted to country life, its fogs, socially freer than Boston and Paris, eternally misty, its lionhunters, rain preferable in, more 'home' to TSE than America, socially more legible than Boston, its society compared to Boston's, TSE's desire to live among cockneys, South Kensington too respectable, Clerkenwell, Camberwell, Blackheath, Greenwich scouted for lodging, its comparatively vigorous religious life, Camberwell lodging sought, Clerkenwell lodging sought, and music-hall nostalgia, abandoned by society in August, the varieties of cockney, TSE's East End sojourn, South Kensington grows on TSE, prepares for Silver Jubilee, South Kensington street names, Dulwich hallowed in memory, so too Greenwich, during 1937 Coronation, preparing for war, Dulwich revisited with family, in wartime, TSE as air-raid warden in, Long Melford, Suffolk, Lowestoft, Suffolk, Lyme Regis, Dorset, with the Morleys, Marlborough, Wiltshire, scene of a happy drink, Needham Market, Suffolk, Newcastle, Northumberland, TSE's visit to, Norfolk, appeals to TSE, Nottingham, Nottinghamshire, dreary, Nottinghamshire, described for EH, Oxford, Oxfordshire, as recollected by TSE, past and present, EH takes lodgings in, haunted for TSE, in July, compared to Cambridge, Peacehaven, Sussex, amazing sermon preached in, Penrith, TSE's visit to, Rochester, as Dickens described, Salisbury, Wiltshire, in the Richmonds' company, Shamley Green, Surrey, TSE's ARP work in, its post office, Pilgrim Players due at, Somerset, highly civilised, TSE at home in, Southwold, Suffolk, TSE visits with family, Stanton, Gloucestershire, on TSE and EH's walk, Stanway, Gloucestershire, on EH and TSE's walk, Suffolk, TSE visits with family, Surrey, Morley finds TSE lodging in, evening bitter at the Royal Oak, TSE misses, as it must have been, Sussex, commended to EH, TSE walking Stane Street and downs, EH remembers, Walberswick, Suffolk, Wells, Somerset, TSE on visiting, Whipsnade, Bedfordshire, EH and TSE visit, Whitchurch Canonicorum, Dorset, delightful name, Wiltshire, highly civilised, TSE at home in, Winchelsea, East Sussex, visited, Winchester, TSE on, Wisbech, Lincolnshire, TSE on visiting, Worcestershire, TSE feels at home in, Yeovil, Somerset, visited en route to East Coker, York, TSE's glimpse of, Yorkshire,
see also British General Election
Flanagan, Hallie, her Sweeney Agonistes, recalls TSE on his own poetry, weakness for 'stunting', looks up TSE in London, theatrical Ritz tea-party for, on further acquaintance, as director, taken on by Smith, and Vassar's Tempest,

5.The directorFlanagan, Hallie Hallie Flanagan (1890–1969), a Professor at Vassar College, was planning to produce Sweeney Agonistes at the Experimental Theater that she had founded at Vassar.

McCarthy, Mary, attends Vassar Sweeney Agonistes production,
Page-Barbour Lectures, The (afterwards After Strange Gods), as yet unwritten, two lectures to be written in two days, finished, TSE stays in Charlottesville during, rewritten for publication, being proofread, approved by D'Arcy, reception, TSE regrets comments on D. H. Lawrence,
poetry, the danger of illustrating, versus the law, as career path, as social construct, as against didacticism, as redefined by Sweeney Agonistes, TSE on his oeurvre, TSE's own reasons for writing, TSE doubts his own, TSE's unrecorded epigram on, TSE on his own, and the importance of models, relieves TSE's longing for EH, nonsense poetry, versus drama, and TSE's new drawing-desk, and theatre-going audiences, and the dissimulation of feeling, TSE on writing after long intermission, jealousy among poets, and personal experience, TSE's defended from EH's charge of 'futility', and emotion, and marriage to VHE, and varieties of audience,
Rukeyser, Muriel, attends the Vassar Sweeney Agonistes,
Sweeney, as pictured by TSE,
Sweeney Agonistes, TSE's desire to illustrate, copy inscribed to EH, defended as poetry, recited for Signet Society, importance of the drummer, rated TSE's best by More, Hallie Flanagan's Vassar production, and TSE's Vassar visit, its characters compared to Auden's, new direction in drama, discussed with Rupert Doone, Group Theatre production, JDH on Doone's production, TSE on Doone's production, Rupert Doone explains his production, reviewed by Desmond MacCarthy, and Yeats's Mercury Theatre season, referred to as 'dance play', revival compared to Group Theatre premiere, EH taken to revival, EH's opinion on, its St. John of the Cross epigraph, TSE reflects on,
Vassar College, and Sweeney Agonistes, TSE's visit remembered and reported, and Hallie Flanagan's role at, TSE remembers his journey to, produces The Tempest,