PostPoems Be Artistic. Be Creative. Be Inspired!

In the autumn of 1978 (that radical year, again), I attended the English Department's "Eliot Seminar," which was offered once every three years, and admission was by invitation only.  (During my previous years at college, I had made more effort to study Eliot, informally, than I had made in my formal classes.)  However, during an ordinary discussion of The Hollow Men, I was openly (and, I believe, rudely) reprimanded by the presiding professor (with the words, "Shut up!") when I suggested that the (then current) Eliot scholarship was still severely lacking in its assessment of Vivienne Eliot's contribution to her husband's definite accomplishment.  Next to me, the lady I had a crush on (nickname, "Sparkie") whispered an apology for having to witness such a humiliation; and then, with a coy smile, slipped her wooden clogs off her sparkling orange socks; remaining unshod for the rest of the class period.  So the afternoon, despite the professor's remark, was not entirely wasted.  Elot had been dead fourteen years at that time; but, as then, so today, his estate (so I have read) goes to enormous lengths and efforts to thwart or obstruct any scholarly interest in Vivienne; and that control extended to department of literature in colleges.  Fortunately, next year, Eliot's letters to Emily Hale, his college girl friend to whom he wrote (long after they had graduated) about his marital troubles, will be published by Harvard University (so I am told).  While they were both living, Eliot attempted to retrieve the letters from Emily Hale.  She refused his repeated requests, even a fairly large cash offer (ten grand, if I remember correctly).  They say he even attempted legal action, but this country's laws (which would have been the venue, since he sent the letters to her residence in Boston) would not have favored his suit.