T. S. Eliot: The Music of Ideas

T. S. ELIOT: "THE MUSIC OF IDEAS" D. BosLEY BROTMAN ANY line, if drawn without deviation, is simply carried farther away from its origin, and ultimately loses itself, or loses at least its connection with its beginning and source. If, however, this line is led back to the starting-point, as in the circle, it describes a satisfying and perfect figure; it perfects, by enclosing space. This principle is fundamental to any classic unity in art. That the poetry of T. S. Eliot has tended to become more classical in form, that the poet has been evolving toward the kind of unity just described, can be seen from a chronological study of his work. That he has been aware of musical forms and the possible analogies between them and the forms of poetry is also apparent, in the poems themselves, and by the poet's own statement in various essays, from Ezra Pound, His Metric and Poetry (1917) to The Music of Poetry (1942). Thus it is not startling to find that in Four Quartets he has achieved a structure analogous to that of the classical sonata form at its apogee as exemplified in the last quartets of Beethoven. To what extent the musical structure has been consciously contrived by the poet is not known by this writer; but that lack of information does not detract from an understanding or enjoyment of the poetry. For the unity is an orgiinic one: the form is implied in the kind of thing-the poet is saying and the way in which it must be said. The implication here is not that poetry and music are in any way the "same thing." The fogginess of some of Mallarme's attempts to equate the two gives evidence (if it is needed) that they are not. And Eliot is well aware that words, besides expressing "visual beauty and beauty of sound . . . [must communicate] a grammatical statement.m But poetry can at least approach the condition of music, and in Four Quartets the poet has, through particular kinds of rhythm and structure, suggested meaningfully both definite ideas and emotions and the forms which they must take. These forms, suggested by the nature of the ideas presented, are implicit in the poetic structure, and in the kind of musical composition already suggested. I realize that too close an analogy of this sort can become procrustean and unprofitable; for the ultimate value of this, as of any work of art, lies in the effect of the whole, to which the strategy of composition of any of its parts is subordinate. On this point Eliot has noted: "In a perfect sonnet, what you admire is not so much the author's skill in adapting himself to the pattern as the skill and power with which he makes the pattern comply with what he has to say. Without this fitness, which is contingent upon period as 1Ezra Pound, His Metric and Poetry (New York, 1917), 14. 20 T. S. ELIOT: "THE MUSIC OF IDEAS" 21 well as individual g'enius, the rest is at best virtuosity."2 Also, formal relationships are by no means an end in themselves: they can be completely meaningless . On the other hand amorphousness in a certain context can be meaningful , can be a form. Eliot has characterized the aims of a poet (or of a period in poetry) as including first of all the search for a "modem colloquial idiom." When this idiom has been stabilized, however, "a period of musical elaboration can follow," a period in which the poet is concerned with further polishing the actual form, and refining "visual beauty and beauty of sound" within his idiom. He continues: I think that a poet may gain much from the study of music: how much technical knowledge of musical form is desirable I do not know, for I have not that technical knowledge myself. But I believe that the properties in which music concerns the poet most nearly, are the sense of rhythm and the sense of structure. I think that it might be possible for a poet to work too closely to musical analogies: the result might be an effect of artificiality; but...