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You should know and no other Podcasts on this topic. We will fight you. Um, no, we are three dudes We work at a classical Christian school in sunny sunny Austin, Texas called Veritas Academy And we like the classical world the old ways of teaching the classical pedagogy and Thinking about virtue and how one teaches virtue in the hearts and minds of students That's what we do most of our days to is contemplate that think about that and then try to implement that into life of our School and hopefully into the life of our listeners and that you guys go and Hopefully if you're class educators, you're thinking of the same things anyway That's what we do here at classical stuff. You should know summer edition Hanneberg's eating cheese it There's a sun streaming in the window.
That's true all the time And we are talking about mr. Thomas Stern's Thomas Stern's brought to us by Thomas Maggie. I like this. Oh, that's my turn.
Okay, so Okay, so we are gonna be talking about TSL yet again today. Why are we talking about TSL yet again? Okay, so we have done always going well in the past and we've done two other episodes on TSL yet So the first episode that I think this is correct. So please you'll tell me if I'm wrong first time We talked about TSL yet.
I brought in a quote of his well I guess see as Lewis quoted TSL yet saying this funny thing about how only modern poets can say whether poetry is good or not That's right. It's position and then see as Lewis discrete with TSL yet, and then we zat here And we also disagreed with TSL yet. Yeah, yeah, so we don't know TSL yet Oh Our second time talking about Well, I'm about to use that phrase again, so please if please react the same way Okay, so the second time we talked about TSL yet We read the wasteland and then we talked about how it was obtuse and hard to read and so we don't come to TSL yet again There, okay, thank you. Good.
Thank you much for good. So I think that I have been somewhat Unteritable toward this TSL yet fellow and so I wanted to do another episode wearing we talk about like Someone good things about this fellow so again Yeah, anyway, so not terrible. Yes. Yes.
Yeah, I mean I I've said I brought the quote I brought the truth thing and the quote of him being wrong about modern poetry and then also Talk about his obtuseness. So we have focused somewhat on like limited times of his life But he is that kind of guy that Where is a cape on ironically? What right? He's someone who probably like wears a cape and a and a walking stick around London.
He's like early hamlet Yeah, he's like we're black because I feel sad mom I have no idea what you want. I don't just look sad. I think I remember reading that like he also would Like like Wear makeup to make his face a lot paler and people be like well hello. Hey there Thomas.
How you doing? He would be like you know, he would say something kind of area He would you know sir something like the world is immense ball of pain. Oh gosh. It's awesome.
I love this So would you just grocery shop? So yes, some of us will be to talk about the goofiness of nothing you think it's the we will reaffirm some things We said especially in regards to the wasteland, but hopefully zoom out a little bit to look at the entirety of TSL It's life so it's not focused exclusively on you know again one work or one quote I'm about the guy so that's the the target for today. So Graham you introduced him this way. I didn't know this version I was so maybe this is really my I knew it for today I found this out probably a month or two ago anyway Thomas earned Elliot as the guy's name TSL yet Born September 1888 to know where he was born Saint Louis, Missouri That's something I never think about like yeah I thought TSL it was a London man No well he was again one of those people that went England and like dropped his American Midwest accent to be to pretend to be British He really he's like the original Gwyneth paltrow That's fine.
Well, it's probably hard to be a poet if you're like the world's a man's I know of the most but so I don't Cape I said go bottom. I PX. Oh my gosh. Okay, so neither of us have ever been to Missouri.
Yeah, we understand we're fending all of our Missouri listenership right now. I'm sure you guys are all great. Yeah, we're talking about the people like down the street from you We're not talking about you. Yeah, so Graham.
Sorry. So so yes, yes, eventually to London. Yes eventually I don't know about the accent, but I guess yes the accent like having heard recordings of him But he also got rid of his American citizenship. He really became a London citizen After moving there called England.
I'm sorry Says into the world my man. Okay, so this actually was so actually we talked about two episodes ago in a weird way Tried to follow the opposite path. So he Huxley born in England tried to move to the United States become a US citizen But was denied that so darn right? Yeah, anyway Too birdy.
Yeah, well, it's because he wouldn't he refused to be enlisted he refused to draft it He refused to like be a part of an American war. Wait, how do I make it in? Did you? You must have been here charming personality.
So anyway, just one of those things where they were born around the same time They traveled in similar circles. So there's a group of writers around that time They are called the Bloomsbury group or the Bloomsbury set and Not if I'm not mistaken either Elliott or Huxley were like full members of that Bloomsbury group or Bloomsbury set But they both kind of like new those group of writers most famously that's written you wolves like group people Do we have a group like our classical educators around this era? Are we part of a group? Do we have a name?
I feel like we would have to like be writing and reading or writing to you are producing a part Sorry, I apologize. Yes, which is just as good. No, yeah The same quality of pros Yeah Like a subreddit you don't want to go there. Yeah, I want to go there any subreddits that I really like want to be a part of Oh, there's like some sweet nature photography.
What really? Good talk. Okay, so There's some sweet nature for And it's also like can you imagine anyone else other than AJ saying that sentence? I can't answer.
There are absolutely trees and bees. Hey, okay, so Yes, born in we just said this born. I'm sorry. So that's just like an interesting thing that again I tend to think that he's a from England as well.
Okay, so what is so if we are tracking through the life of T.S. Elliot I'm gonna focus mainly on his works if you want to read up biography of him go crazy So the wasteland actually the wasteland is not his first like major work It work comes before that the love song of day offer proof rock. I don't think we talked about it on here But in us making jokes about T.S. Elliot being really goofy Recently my wife and I've been moving into a new house and which means we've been like unearthing all of our old stuff And so one of the things I've unearthed is my old poetry binder from like middle school And so and so you know it's a binder hand if you want Thomas to bring that and read it on the air yeah two hands Are obviously I'm not going to happen so I open up the binder and 66% my friend well that is not a passing score So here we are okay So on the so open up the binder you know my beautiful poetry is on the right and in the front like the front little like folder thing We can put papers inside it is a printed out copy from it must be 15 years ago of love song of jail for proof rock So clearly the sign that this guy Is a horrible poet is that I like you guys that I really like poetry?
Yeah, yeah, I have no notes written on it. I clearly have like just printed off to look really cool Anyway, I was a wonderful Yeah, so part of the University of Texas. I think this is still true the coffee shop that's connected to their large libraries called proof rocks Yeah, yeah off of this poem so we still visit all the time. Yeah, so there I remember my first time going to UT was In high school and seeing that coffee shop being like this is the place for me anyway, so Where's my cape?
Yeah, maybe maybe I'm did you hook them Thomas? Do I hook the horns? No hook home is my question who who me? Swoped Tom?
Hook it yeah, um what? That's when you graduate you get the um hook Like we did it everybody. Yeah, it's good. Um, it's kind of like a threatening thing though To like hook someone it's like it's a long horn like all the Texas colleges have threatening chance Okay, I'm gonna stab them with a spear.
You know, I'm gonna give them Baron Klom. No, what's the what's the second? Sick them and then there's like shoot them right? I'm like a hug them.
There's like a hug them. They're not a Be charitable towards them. Yeah, educate them They're about to get stories about the so you know, you know University of Texas actually sends a long horn to the football field Which makes no sense and in there's the same You know I've been running for your clothes. Yeah, anyway same person wait No, it's bebo bebo has like killed other mascots before so anyway, you see that's awesome Oh my question is the mascot he killed person in a costume Or person squirrel who has a squirrel is their mascot embarrassing?
Okay, almost as embarrassing as having a love song of a Proof rock in your poetry binder in middle school. Hey segue. Okay, so one of his early made early made work also So then that's 1915 eventually the wasteland will be written in 1922 So we've already read the wasteland if you are interested in that you should go in And again like I always think it's like a better use of your timeless Nerf you hear us quote things because like the thing we quote is more eloquent than any thought that we will have on the podcast Okay, so wasteland how do you not put you agree with that statement? We think we're better than TSL My mouth drips gold.
Okay proud of you all. Okay, so The grill that I have It's actually a very serious medical condition. Yeah, you're really really a very serious problem You should not break it. It will kill you one day.
Yeah, okay So the wasteland in reading the wasteland, how would you describe the like feeling of that poem? Is this like a like positive rah-rah? It is a poem of lostness and adriftness and thirsty It's a new way down lost in a sea of sadness. Yeah Sushkap.
What? Sushkap. Oh sorry. Sushkap.
I feel like I have to read it. Sushkap is a bummer poem. So yes, it's a bummer poem This is a line from it just to this is actually from the very end of it I believe so to kind of get that feeling of how the poem the feeling of how the poem feels again My eloquence is not on this podcast. Okay, I sat upon the shore fishing with the arid plane behind me shall I at least set my lands in order London Bridge is falling down falling down falling down I'm gonna Why is it cose kegliafina?
I was gonna do the translation because I'm on pretentious. So So that don't yeah, so London Bridge is falling down falling down falling down what Graham just said in English is in so I pray you by that virtue which guides you to the top of the stair be reminded in my time of pain oh swallow swallow You want to say the next one? No? The Prince of Aquitaine at the abandoned tower these fragments I have short against my ruins why then I'll fit you Geronimo's mad again dada da da bum da maata shanti shanti shanti so it's a bummer It's a bummer.
I thought you're gonna like correct pronunciation, which would also be appropriate No, but it didn't even like in looking at the poem maybe oh so thank you. Thank you very much So even in like say chippin chippin idea boy, what's happening? Okay, so have I what? Cesar hail caesar yeah, no I've never said Chippin chippin hail caesar is a masterful.
It's a converse movie. It was so good and it's about the filming of Wasn't it when Marlon Brando did Julius Caesar? Oh is it? Anyway, yeah speaking of T.S.
Eliot So even if you were look at the poem on the page it looks like the poem is almost falling apart by the end the way the spacing is Working the way the lines are getting farther and farther apart so it's kind of this expression that Something has something has fallen something has broken something is like irreveably changed. It's a bummer of a poem You should do listen to that episode to be bummed out. Okay, so he writes that he then follows that up with a poem That's similar in tone the holliman in 1925 and it's just following the same idea of like things are bad things like okay So it was a rough time. You was a rock, but this is okay.
This is great. So it is actually a rough time Almost like jazz music. Okay, that's the only thing that's good, but not only what makes it a rough time There's like this angst among like these writers of like things actually feel really bad, but the broader context is World War one right the broader context is This is great war that is never really gets a It just sort of ends and no one really knows how to deal with it There's no there's no great like burying the dead and saluting and everything sort of we did this for the right reasons It just kind of ends and then people try to ignore it with like parties and drinking in the jazz age and like internet speculations I mean stock speculation I'm reading a biography of Dietrich Bonhoeffer right now and they pronounce it Bonhoeffer is this Tuesday the audiobook the sorry Okay, it's they're wrong. Okay, so um so in the story they talk about World War one like Dietrich's experience of World War one and they go into it with his optimism like war is this great little thing like we These boys will get to show off They get to like become men through this process they get to be heroic they get to come back with these awesome stories instead We're ship back our body backs.
It's it's a slaughter. It's it's death upon death on death Yeah, there's there was a famous recruitment poster Which was a man sitting by a fire smoking his pipe and a little girl presumably his daughter like his son and daughter saying they're saying like what did you do during the Great War Daddy and And you can tell by the expression on his face that he didn't enlist and how shameful it be you need to tell your future generation that you fought for your Country so it was this idea that the war would yeah that it was the your duty to do yeah Yeah, and I you know if I prepared well I would actually have more numbers with me But there's also the strange thing in World War one where I higher percentage of the people going to war died It was a more lethal war than historically because historically like you know your commanders or someone would die or It was more a war of attrition. There weren't as many deaths or you know you'd get stabbed which is not great, but Stopping steel. Yeah, exactly.
It's not it's not like a gun shooting to kill. It's just it's different So I'm where the world war one is when we move the way like we're not doing musket balls anymore, right? We're doing the kind of rounds that mushroom inside you and explode and let's or that so Graham likes to read that or has That quote about how technology is gonna be really awesome for us Well, all that excitement about technology was put toward how can we make this stuff as lethal as possible? Yeah, the machine guns and the tactics and the tactics didn't catch up to like figure out how to deal with machine guns So exactly so it's the same tactics of like, you know us on horse, but instead of that it's a machine done.
You're running toward You know, I mean like it was horrendous. Okay, so yeah, it's sort of five minutes reloading your weapon It's instantaneous and the musket's very funny and that the aim on it is horrible And so even if you're like directly aiming at someone it could just totally you know shoot off the balls spun real bad And so you kind of never know who you're actually gonna hit and that changes when you get into you know, hi magazine fire So anyway, so that's like what is surrounding Elliot in writing the wasteland. So there are reasons. It's a super-fumber He's not the only one who follows in this vein of super-fumber writing again This bloomsberry group which he was acquainted but not necessarily a part of is again Virginia wolf is Like most famously a part of this My list pulled up a second ago.
John Mater Keynes was involved in this which seems still crazy to me You enforce her we're also involved in this but just the only thing to draw out in this group is that with the Despair surrounding them many members of this group would go on to commit suicide. We go on to kill themselves So wolf obviously I'm trying to self-fill her coat with rocks and going into a river near her home another member shot herself Ezra Pound who is Involved in this group would be put into a psychiatric hospital for 12 years I'm just not having any condition like no condition other than like the over focus on the sadness in the world So this sadness overcame many people in this group so sadness around the world these they're kind of bouncing it back and forth among themselves So that's where the wasteland comes out of and hollamoment if you're into that okay, but T.S. It's path does not follow that one. He was like does not end in suicide his life is not in despair What major of life event happens after the wasteland?
T's conversion is conversion what's he convert to? Niiinckenism what's up? So T.S. Eliot converts in 1927 so again wasteland 1922 hollamen is 1925 conversion is 1927 and then after this point there's just a market change in His writing yeah first off his poetry, but then his like major his commercial success Came in play writing murdering the cathedral yeah, and that would come after this conversion so I read it and I guess another another by again if I come prepared I would have done that on Tom's Becket Is there comedy is it fun?
No Tom's Becket the martyrdom and killing Tom's Becket yeah by King Henry the second I have to pick a play for this year. I'm not gonna be in this maybe doing the Shakespeare version of Star Wars I would love to do that. It's a long oh really just cut it down. It's so fun though.
Think about the fun special effects We do yeah, so then we just told you problem okay, so conversion 1927 and then major works that kind of for that are Ash Wednesday 1930 which is still not like a super Like not happy like over the moon poem, but again very changed Christian I guess they're sadness in the world but like with a foundation of Christianity like there's a meaning to that So he then follows it up with a series of poems which are the four quartets first of which is a 1936 and later in 1942 So the only thing I'm trying to draw out here is that when the wasteland is pointed to as like this is Elliot's thought on whatever It's like that's his thought in 1927. That's which I guess I should have also looked up how old he would have been When he was 39 so he's not super young but anyway, there was a younger Elliot who was writing that poem That's the only point I'm gonna draw here and then also to say that he was able to find a foundation in that time of Misery sadness despair surrounding him and that frame was his faith and that's what allowed him to again bounce off that low point of the wasteland in the holomend that Like there's no way you follow that direction and like still live a meaningful and fulfilled life Yeah, just see that like everything around you is falling apart It's I mentioned it in the Elliot podcast or the waycelyn podcast But it's always amazed me that Tolkien and Lewis both men who also fought in the war who also experienced the same event that all these All these other men experienced leave it and have Have a place to put it in in the depravity of man or the brokenness of the world and but also trusting in you know The goodness of God whereas these these other you know At the time seen as greater intellectual men as opposed to writers of children's stories You know are are under completely I sort of undone by this undone by this thing Yeah, and it also makes me think of your of the then sass categories that like you need some way of understanding the world around you Okay, so I guess well That was on my list and his response there another thing that I find helpful and interesting in TSL yet is that he cares about the classics he we know that he cares about the classics for the way that he makes references throughout We saw in the wasteland It makes it somewhat frustrating to read because in coming across as references We don't like I didn't know what a lot of it meant and so I just kind of kept going And I think I said it on that episode that if Graham hadn't been reading it in his radio voice I probably wouldn't have known like what was happening or ha I don't even know if that's the right interpretation But at least to have some way of understanding this this poem was really helpful for me So a thing that Elliot would say about himself is that he was a classicist in literature a royalist in politics and an angle Anglo-Catholic in religion. I thought that was like that his incorporation of illusions his incorporation of metaphor imagery Is not unique to him. He's not the only person who is making reference after reference after reference So at the beginning of the wasteland he says that do we call it dedication every other word He calls him he calls him as a pound like the grand craftsman or it's like to the grand craftsman That's a pound was very influential in helping the wasteland become the work that would eventually be but this is as a pound doing If not his version of the wasteland something that he wanted to be the way.
I don't know. I'll just read it That's fun. Okay, so this is from Ezra pounds the cantos. Do you all do you all know anything about the cantos?
We talked about the cantos in colloquially amongst ourselves. I can't tell this is is Yeah, just a poem that that pound wrote that is Decipherable I mean that is the correct way of the time. Yeah, 116 sections it is incomplete It's it was written of course of what's that 50 years 40 years? So he's done a lot of time on this and especially in his like waning last 12 years spent a lot of time on this It is somewhat notable that if you pick it up first off, it's it's very long So usually when you get it you'll get like sections of it There are certain like there are some sections that are clearer and more cogent than others and those are usually separated And you can just get those if you get the whole thing It's very long and then there you'll get funny things like entire pages will just be like Chinese characters or yes Elliott will bring in languages and in the wasteland, but as a pound will be again like whole sections will be in German or like it's Indecipherable is probably the best way of describing it.
So this is a particularly fun quote from it to the end for fat oxen Uh, uh, can I say it? I'm gonna say this and hopefully you will make fun of me To the end for fat oxen having their arses white and in general being tidied up to serve god under my window with stoles of imperial purple with tassels and grooms before the karate Show on which the karek six lion heads to receive the wax offerings thus arrives the gold eagles the banners of the contrary and box of candles Yeah, said the left front ox suddenly but nah as they tied on his red front band stank to george to hokey pokey stands in the unicorn Nikkyo Nikkyo nei That I don't know so that words the CNE's females get that way from the daylight and is from continual plugging uphill one box marked 200 leerah Alias served god with candles with a polyo and 17 banners and when six men had hoisted up the big candle a bit Askew and the karek and the four ox had been finally wiped they set off toward the Duomo time consumed one hour in 17 minutes So this is this is now my new definition of obtuse like I have no idea what's happening in here And I don't think pound wants us to know what's happening here like the dude loves a spectacle. Yes, and he he was a great fascist He was a great fashion. Well, because that's the spectacle and the pageantry and the robes and the whole structure So neo-paganism of the whole thing he was in charge.
We'd be looking at a military parade is what you're saying Well, he was he loves us. He loved Mussolini, right? He was good. Yeah, and that's what got him in trouble in the States.
I get this part wrong He was he was going to be um killed for treason So anyway part one of his reasons for being an institution for his 12 years is that that was as opposed to him being punished for being a fascist Yeah, so he was put into and it was a tiny cell. I think it was six like six six feet by six feet by six feet Yeah, anyway, it was not a happy ending for him, but like this is this is what Elliot was influenced by like this difficulty of I don't know I want to say it's a waste but it feels that way. There's an arrogance to it. There's a there's a there's a pageantry to it and then there's um There's a sense of I'm purposefully elevating myself from you you reader which Elliot was influenced by yeah Yeah, I don't want to draw too large a gap between the two because some piece of the wasteland is that that again?
Elliot wrote pages and pages of wasteland and the other panel would just go through and cut out sections So the entire you can look this up online when you look at the manuscripts of it essentially the first page Which was Elliot kind of laying the scene work of who were some characters? Like what's what's the action happening here? Elliot cuts the whole thing out and says just go into just go into the story Just go into the poem. Um, so Elliot is influenced by that with the wasteland But again, the wasteland is not the only poem that Elliot writes and that's that's why I'm leading That's why I'm getting to with all this so I think there's a helpful way of bringing in illusions and imagery and metaphor It can go too far.
Um, and I think oh no Elliot realized that to the degree that he tones that down in his later works. You need to be charitable to your reader, right? Um, I'll be good. You said that I wasn't gonna read this.
This is just a funny thing that so the four quartets again written between 1936 and 1942 It's four poems. It's white to the four quartets. Um, the third one opens with like a dislike. I'll just read it I need to make sure I pronounce this correctly.
It's uh, solvages. The dry-style of ages presumably he puts it in french But he translates it he tells you what that french word means by the title of this work It's a small group of rocks with a beacon off the northeast coast of Cape Ann, Massachusetts The word of the poem is pronounced to rhyme with s wages So it's self-ages that dries self-ages and then he defines one of his words later, later, groaner, whistling boy So this is like incomprehensible to think that he would have given this to the wasteland or the hollomans Sort of intro that says this is what i'm talking about in this poem Like he's growing in this charity as he gets older and older to the reader This is just the only one point but it's something that like really struck me of like we would never have seen something like this in his earlier work Yeah, I I don't think that's unique to him as a as a poetic author. They're other authors who as they grow They're like man, I have no idea what I was talking about earlier I and they tend to be more charitable for readers. I'm thinking of bob dylan bob dylan when he looked at some of his old songs He's like, man, I don't know what I was thinking I was young I tried to make more sense now and uh, did the guy who wrote howl say the same thing ginserg?
Yeah, gins man. Yeah, he's like, I don't know what angel had hipster is. That doesn't make sense But now I write it different but I wrote it that way then so maybe it's maybe it's just that the the importance of youth You you end up being a little more fragmented and not as clear to your reader. I don't Never think about that.
My early poetry certainly makes a lot less sense than my later poetry Or you must have mind was just like I need to express this like it's just so important Got to get out the few learn right? Yeah, it was I don't know I think there's that that like notion that what you're doing is capturing a moment of feeling rather than expressing a clear idea Is is definitely a modern notion about poetry. No, so i'll just review quotes from this and we can talk about them as we go So this is from the first of four poems is bern Norton. Uh, so What's another thing to throw in there all four of these He has a really interesting through line of trying to explore.
I mean the question is kind of how does time work? How does the present? Well, yeah, how does the present relate to the past and future? What is in the past and future?
And kind of what's the most important of those three that's a thing that's a theme he'll come back to in each of the four Um, I don't think any of these quotes will draw that out, but it's just something that's interesting So this is from the very end of this again. Why am I reading this? I'm reading this to draw a Contrast to what we've read of Elliot on the podcast before so I almost don't see how this is the same uh poet at this point The detail of the pattern is movement as in the figure of the 10 stairs desire itself is movement not in itself desirable Love is itself unmoving only the cause and end of movement timeless and undesiring except in the aspect of time caught in the form of limitation Between being and being is this a slightly pretentious Paragraph, but far more comprehensible than the wasteland. What is he like?
What's he saying? Like what's arguing? Like I can read again. Yeah, I do I'm gonna skip that part desire itself So I skipped the first one there before the detail of the pattern is movement as in the figure of the 10 stairs But it's an image that he's repeated before let's unfair of me to bring it up here So desire itself is movement not in itself desirable love is itself unmoving only the cause and end of movement Timeless and undesiring except in the aspect of time caught in the form of limitation between being and being So desire is bad.
Love is good. Love is the end of desire. Whereas desire is moving love is stable Yeah, is that kind of what's one desirable pull us to this thing of love? We don't want to stay in the movement.
We want to get to the thing. Yeah, and desire in itself is not something you want right? You want love Yeah, I'm with it. Yeah, um, so hey, I understood some T.
Yeah, that's that's the part that's like that's crazy like Yeah, so this is what's that 20? It's 14 years later and I don't know like he is getting to a point What am I trying to say? He is conveying something that's like moving and understandable at the same time Yeah, so that's all I'm trying to make with that first point. Okay, so there's a four-year gap between these two poems I think I'll just read this one quote at the very end because I love it So there's a four-year gap because during this time Elliott is worried that he'll never write another poem again It's almost it's not writers block.
It's more that he's like lost the muse He's like lost that ability to Tap into the words to like express himself through poetry That's like that's a writer thing too with the guy who wrote the infinite jest what's his name? David Fossel has the same thing after he wrote his big, you know, infinitesity Infinitesity was like I can never do this. I can never do this again. Oh, no I don't know if it was that one or anything wrote the what the pale king no the Pale king's I was going he did right later, but I think he went under over like a crippling oh sure it did And I think that same thing happens to musical artists right they write their big first album And that's why you have the sophomore slump is they're like can I ever do this again and then I have neuroses and like when you have a famous work It is hard to meet the expectations even you know you place upon yourself Because there wasn't an expectation with the first poem right like no one knew you were you can kind of do whatever you want to and now It could be building for ages for your first album There's songs you've written over your entire life for your second one you got two years Yeah, right and so he I guess and So he kind of shifted away.
So instead of focusing on poetry This is more his playwright time murder and cathedral came out around the same time as bern Norton But like that is what kept him busy was the playwriting um so he there was the distraction there But there was like a sadness of like you're saying age not being able to write another poem like he's dsl the poet who's never gonna be able to write again And so he would he would write a full disk in in the drawer and handed back is that how good I might sweet love So he to overcome this writer's block or two over I hope you I think you all my life at this Okay, I don't think this is funny until here we are serious dollars Remember the time we get about the word duty to free up straight I tried really hard earlier when you guys were talking about your duty to go to war I was like this is where I came at. I came at it. Good for you. Okay, so we've grown I did I didn't laugh No, we've watched my career.
Okay, so he wanted to overcome this writer's block You wanted to overcome this feeling of never being able to write a poem again And so he would practice writing a poem and the poem he chose to rewrite was bern Norton He chose to rewrite his own poem over and over again Anyway, so I thought it was kind of like I don't know if I bear it's not here again That's like you pick anything to write over and over again. You pick your own poem. That's funny So maybe maybe the idea was to stay in his own voice. That's fair.
That's totally fair Right if I be right home over and over again my next poem is good. It sounds like Homer Which maybe that's a good thing That's what art of mainland is that a piece about how to improve your writing is to take the greats and to like write them out by long hand There's there's some ideas floating around in just in terms of writing instruction that When you're teaching students to really get better at writing stop asking them to write essays in their own voice and start asking them to Copy great sections of works memorize great pieces of literature And then and then you'll see that that those sorts of habits and forms end up coming in the writing In fact, I think I see that we see that as teachers of writing here is that you get students to memorize We have some memorized sections of books and oh, there's oh man. What was it? There was something I was reading the other day and the student used Some anachronistic phrase that was like old and British but they used it like sort of naturally in their writing the right way And I was just like oh my goodness Like it's just it's naturally come out of them because they've read so much Shakespeare or something like that or so much of these sort of These older older classic books.
Well, it's not a silly idea I mean when you're when you're learning to paint it is better sure Yeah, you copy the master's try to copy the masters and then well I mean there's a lot of things for you It means that you're you're trying to imitate the absolute best there is and on top of that it takes away the pressure of creation Yeah, right even if you screw it up that doesn't mean you're an idiot Right doesn't mean you're a bad painter just means that you have a little ways to go You didn't have to invent it. I don't know I I'm trying to do the same thing with music currently right if I write a bad song That feels bad But I'm just trying to copy somebody else it kind of takes that pressure away the pressure of creativity Skill you would have gotten from writing your own exactly I learned a lot of the same skills In fact, I'm learning the skills that the greats have rather than whatever trash I put out which it is pretty bad That's funny. I didn't so grab your comment of like the students trying to use their Or no, you don't you don't want to lose the student's voice as one of you just said that and you kind of do like yeah It's something since I want to lose whenever I try and write and it comes off as shallow That's because I'm shallow and so I want to copy the writing of people who aren't shallow right so I can just write that out my hand So uh, so this is from his second poem so Again, he has four years of not being able to write poetry and so his the second one is East Coker I'm the teacher named after locations And there's something about that where the wasteland is also a location name, but it's not real There's not an actual Wasteland that he's talking about a four-goal wasteland But each of these four poems have a physical location to them and there's something that is more embodied in the poem that I'll just read it because I think with that background you'll it will draw out more of what he's saying here This is the very end of East Coker the second of the four quartets So here I am in the middle way having had 20 years 20 years largely wasted the years between the two great wars He hasn't infringed there, but I'm translating it Trying to learn to use words and every attempt is a wholly new start and a different kind of failure because one has only learned to get The better of words for the thing one no longer has to say or the way in which one is no longer disposed to say it And so each venture is a new beginning arrayed on the interticulate with shabby equipment always deteriorating in the general mess of imprecision of feeling Undisciplined squads of emotions and what there is to conquer by strength and submission has already been discovered once or twice or several times By men who one cannot hopes to emulate but there is no competition There's only the fight to recover what has been lost and found and lost again and again and now under conditions that seem Unprovitus, but perhaps another gain nor loss for us. There's only the trying the rest is not our business That's what that section so what is that so what's great?
Well, what I think he is he's talking about that struggle to write again Um that the skills he have only helped him fight a war he's already fought and so his responsibility isn't the success of that poem Again again, he ends it with for us. There's only the trying the rest is not our business His job is to try again and again with the tools he has As imperfect as those tools are yeah and again the success comes outside of that What do you got you seem like you're like really think about it? No, I was just thinking like just thinking about that idea of copying and The difference like you want to like copy the great so you can emulate the greats, but also Finding your own voice in there. We actually had an email about this and I promise we talk about it at some point I'm thinking of making a whole episode, but we had talked a little while ago about um I think it was during your hero's podcast where we were talking about should we emulate everything about Hector?
And the question that came in was if we had said oh we should take a little bit of hero We should take the best parts of heroes or we should be looking at the heroes and asking ourselves if they are conforming to the ideal type or not And the question a listener emailed in was if you do that Do you not just end up losing yourself and then you sort of lost your identity? Um, I what point are you just like an amalgamation of all these borrowed identities versus your true your true self? I know this isn't the conversation we're having right now, but I was just thinking that was just reminded of me I did I told him I told the the Person on the email that we would have we would talk about it on on a podcast episode Maybe you gave a longer email response. I certainly have thoughts about it Yeah, my thought is that you don't have your own personality and there is nothing to do under the sun Every creative thing is an amalgamation of or an amalgam of things that have come before right there is I see we table discussion and have it and hash it out at some point and not hijack port maybe this discussion of Elliot, which I is good That's kind of you.
I was playing on just I'm wrapping things up right about there and ending with this question because that's all your email response Um, I want to give some peace of well, okay. Let me just wrap up on the tsl. It's like second of it. Um Uh, this has been intended like a more charitable reading of Elliot broadly and I have found his later poetry much more helpful engaging Um, then the wasteland is at first blush because again Uh, the wasteland is like not made to be like a friendly approach Well home because it's not a friendly or approachable picture But it's not to say that you listener would not enjoy the four quartets especially or perhaps even ash Wednesday So I would just encourage for the reading on him I think there's a reason that Elliot gets all this praise is a great 20th century poet And I think that like my portrayal of him as he has a bad opinion on poets or he's too obtuse is not fair to the man himself So it was probably fair to young out to younger Elliot.
Yeah, maybe yeah Yeah, that later stuff was really enjoyable. Yeah, it's probably the same with us like these podcasts we're doing right now are arrogant and obtuse But our older partners. Yeah in 20 years when we are charitable older when we define our terms when we slow down a little bit more Why'd you look at me when I was like in your eyes? Oh, yes, and we'll be a little more um accessible.
That's good one day. One day with that. Okay, so I'm just on the mama teaching on having heroes So can I read sure I'll just read the whole question. Um Just make sure you're right towards the middle of the episode on the medic teaching you while we're discussing the heroes We have 15 minutes for this.
This will be just probably a start to get the discussing the heroes of the elia You said that we ought to be hectares in some places and agaxes and others However, I'm concerned that if you start pulling the best qualities from everyone around you then there's no real you left You are merely a walking program of the people around you. I'm interested in what you'll have to say about this I think that is that is a helpful distinction to draw out And I think that I I'm probably like oversimplifying it to say we'll take the best part of agax at the best part of hector Take the best part of Achilles and then be that person I think it's significant that even in the story those are different people in the story Leech if you were to just say I want to be hector you would have certain flaws as a part of that again hector loses the combat at the end like um Yeah, if you were to only be agax you would be there would be certain weaknesses as a part of you But we have those weaknesses and so it is fair to acknowledge that to set one person as your hero is to say that you prioritize certain attributes over others That's one statement second statement is that um I always feel like I need to distinguish between personality and virtue And so any example of virtue is an example for all of us to follow those virtues We'd like we should all desire to be virtuous But there are personality differences between hector agax Achilles name your person queen arate like name your person There are personality differences between them and we're not supposed to emulate all of those We are going to be different on personality, but we should be similar on virtue So those are just two first thoughts I had with that so finishing thought I said that there was you know, nothing going to the sun and everyone so Let me qualify that a little bit I think everyone is to a certain degree a walking program of the people around them right you will have drawn Ideas and notions and tendencies from your parents. I can't tell you how many times I've met a kid and met their parents and said yeah That makes sense, right? You will draw part of your sense of humor from the things going on around you I would say that a good chunk of my generation was influenced specifically by the movie dumb and dumber whereas This generation is probably more influenced by names and tell me I'm wrong.
You're not over. It's a card again And and so to an extent we are pulling How do I have gas? So to an extent we're pulling from all those things around us and that doesn't necessarily mean that all we are as a pastiche It means that all those words Well, don't think you're good All those things come together to make us something new right adding different elements to make a compound Right you are perhaps a unique combination But the things that have gone into that combination are not unique Right your combination of nature and nurture and nurture is a big piece of personality and virtue, right? Yeah, sure nature will be kind of its own original thing because DNA is original But everybody's a human everybody tends towards the same sense You haven't invented a new one just as you probably have not invented a new virtue Right your personality might be different than anybody else's but you're gonna find people like you So I don't know that being tied to having a completely original personality is something we should seek or even worry about I'm not gonna worry about losing my personality what I'm going to worry about is Choosing the best pieces of the people around me and trying to emulate those because that is how I become the best I agree with that I've only brought the any of your grandmup ones on this podcast So I feel like I'm doing well for myself I think there is something to be said for like we the three of us should have different heroes because our like the best Graham the best aj the best Thomas will look different from the best of my best will look different than Graham's best Will look different than aj is best of course the number three would say that Number five so And so that's the other piece that I hope that I drew out in the episode and if I didn't I'll just restate it here that again Those moral attributes we need anything that's moral is not an individual difference We should be moral we should fall over to you But we should find heroes that are akin to us in that personality to show us what like the better Thomas looks like Yeah, I agree I mean, yeah, if I think about the differences between us I know that mr.
Donaldson over here is particularly more about the Questions that are a little further off the ground than I am He likes to think about where we are headed as an organization what it means to be in this modern world And typically I like to concern myself with things that are a little closer to the ground, right? But that's not a moral difference. That's not a moral difference It's just simply a difference in tendency. Yes.
Yes. Yes. If I tackle the question that the listener put in I get the sense that authenticity ends up so that what I hear or my interpretation of the question is is oh my goodness If I start trying to emulate all these other people, I'm gonna lose myself in the process Therefore I need to be just true to myself and I guess the implication is not let other people affect me so deeply or whatever My understanding my gut reaction is that if you try to be authentic Real authenticity and real individuality of character comes not from seeking that out as an end It's a byproduct and if you try to see that out as an end you actually end up being as boring and bland as everybody else who is self-focused and if you sort of Not care about yourself or if you don't really think about how you as a person are developing you are going after and trying to emulate heroes I actually think you end up being quite unique and interesting It's kind of similar to what C. S.
Lewis says I pulled it up. I read it the quote about saints No, it's about being original. I was thinking like when C. S.
Lewis talks about to wait hold on When someone's Lewis talks about saints he says like The tyrants of the world are are unique or the times of the world are all like the same But those who are saints those who thought about God and have tried to emulate the perfection of God end up being completely diverse and being Sort of their own individual person So it's kind of that weird dichotomy of if you want to find yourself you need to die You need to let you you need to lose yourself. Can I read I have a quote talking about this is from mere christianity Uh, but there must be a real real giving up of the self. You must throw it away blindly So to speak Christ will indeed deed give you a real personality But you must not go to him for the sake of that Yeah, as long as your own personality is what you are bothering about you are not going to him at all The very first step is try to forget about the self altogether your real new self Which is Christ's and also yours and yours just because it is his will not come along as you are looking for it It will come when you are looking for him. Does that sound strange?
The same principle holds you know for more everyday matters even in social life You will never make a good impression on other people until you stop thinking about what sort of impression you are making even in literature and art No man who bothers about originality will ever be original Whereas if you simply try to tell the truth without caring too pence about how often it has been told before you will nine times out of 10 Become original without ever having noticed noticed it the principle runs through all life from top to bottom Give up yourself and you will find your real self lose your life and you will save it Submit to death death of your ambitions and favorite wishes every day and death of your whole body in the end Submit every fiber of your being and you will find eternal life keep back nothing Nothing that you have not given away will ever be really yours Nothing in you that has not died will ever be raised from the dead Look for yourself and you will find in the long run only hatred loneliness despair rage ruin and decay But look for Christ and you will find him and with him everything else thrown in yep I think that's the same sentiment. I mean when you're trying to emulate heroes. It's it's it's a The same mechanism the same sort of like pre-Christian mechanism that we now do as Christians of emulating Christ So so the concern Being so the concern is that there's no real you left but in a way like that's the goal Yeah, the goal is to have less of that. He must increase.
I must decrease. Yeah, I like that So anything else pilly to say on that one cool. I feel like I should try to follow see I know I know I my mouth does drip gold. I said a couple of ages mouth just cuz I need to go build today This has been lent with that one.
This has been classical stuff You should know with Graham Thomas and AJ you can email us at classical stuff at veritasacademy.net You can tweet at us at cool school stuff on Twitter. Yeah, I know we should probably like manifest us need the classical stuff at classical stuff We're working on it. We're working on it. And You what else?
Stuff.net we are trucking up to episode 100 We have no ideas as to what to do if we should celebrate episode 100 If you have ideas email us or tweet towards us. Um, and we hope that you're enjoying a beautiful summer I'm pushing for an evening where section oh we should do an evening where that's all right. Yeah a talent show. Yeah, huh?
Let's do that. All right. Anyway, guys you had all the power. Yeah, you do it.
Oh my god. We're all piece It's good. I like this is a good plan. Okay, pageant.
Yeah, we're gonna do a pageant All right, we're gonna do a pageant with over an audio media. This is a wonderful idea. I have been told I have a face-or-radio Wonderful. I feel like I've been doing a beauty pageant every recording and it's just not going appreciated.
Yeah, so sorry about that All right. This is classical stuff signing off. Thanks for listening. Bye