Home Literary Studies Engaging with T.S. Eliot: Four Quartets as a Multimedia Performance
Article
Licensed
Unlicensed Requires Authentication

Engaging with T.S. Eliot: Four Quartets as a Multimedia Performance

  • Katrin Röder EMAIL logo
Published/Copyright: October 7, 2016
Become an author with De Gruyter Brill

Abstract

This article explores a recent performance of excerpts from T.S. Eliot’s Four Quartets (1935/36–1942) entitled Engaging Eliot: Four Quartets in Word, Color, and Sound as an example of live poetry. In this context, Eliot’s poem can be analysed as an auditory artefact that interacts strongly with other oral performances (welcome addresses and artists’ conversations), as well as with the musical performance of Christopher Theofanidis’s quintet “At the Still Point” at the end of the opening of Engaging Eliot. The event served as an introduction to a 13-day art exhibition and engaged in a re-evaluation of Eliot’s poem after 9/11: while its first part emphasises the connection between Eliot’s poem and Christian doctrine, its second part – especially the combination of poetry reading and musical performance – highlights the philosophical and spiritual dimensions of Four Quartets.


Corresponding author: PD Dr. Katrin Röder, Department of English and American Studies, University of Potsdam, Am Neuen Palais 10, 14469 Potsdam, Germany

Works Cited

Abercrombie, Nicholas and Brian Longhurst (1998). Audiences: A Social Theory of Performance and Imagination. London: Sage.10.4135/9781446222331Search in Google Scholar

Alighieri, Dante (2009). The Divine Comedy. Trans. H. F. Cary. Hertfordshire: Wordsworth Editions Ltd.Search in Google Scholar

Atkins, Douglas (2012). Reading T.S. Eliot: Four Quartets and the Journey toward Understanding. New York, NY: Palgrave Macmillan.10.1057/9781137011589Search in Google Scholar

Begbie, Jeremy (2015). “Curriculum Vitae.” <https://divinity.duke.edu/sites/divinity.duke.edu/files/documents/cv/BegbieCV-0714.pdf> (November 27, 2015).Search in Google Scholar

Botterill, Steven (1994). Dante and the Mystical Tradition: Bernard of Clairvaux in the Commedia. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.10.1017/CBO9780511611735Search in Google Scholar

Butler, Judith (2007). “Performative Acts and Gender Constitution: An Essay in Phenomenology and Feminist Theory.” Henry Bial, ed. The Performance Studies Reader. London and New York, NY: Routledge, 187–199.Search in Google Scholar

Davis, Ellen (2009). Scripture, Culture, and Agriculture: An Agrarian Reading of the Bible. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.10.1017/CBO9780511815041Search in Google Scholar

Davis, Ellen (2015). “Curriculum Vitae.” <https://divinity.duke.edu/sites/divinity.duke.edu/files/documents/cv/CV-EFD-1014.pdf> (November 27, 2015).Search in Google Scholar

Derrida, Jacques (2007). “Excerpt from ‘Signature Event Context.’” Henry Bial, ed. The Performance Studies Reader. London and New York, NY: Routledge, 184–186.Search in Google Scholar

Engaging Eliot. Opening Evening, January 28, 2013, Duke University Chapel (2013). Dir. Rev Dr Fred Westbrook. <https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qBD_OWu9UA8> (November 27, 2015).Search in Google Scholar

Engaging Eliot Colloquium, January 29, 2013 (2013). Duke Initiatives in Theology and the Arts. <https://www.flickr.com/photos/duketheologyandarts/with/9087045921/> (November 27, 2015).Search in Google Scholar

Eliot, T.S. (1940). The Idea of a Christian Society. New York, NY: Harcourt and Brace.Search in Google Scholar

Eliot, T.S. (1943). Four Quartets. New York, NY: Harcourt, Brace and World.Search in Google Scholar

Eliot, T.S. (1948). Notes towards a Definition of Culture. London: Farber and Farber.Search in Google Scholar

Eliot, T.S. (2011). “T.S. Eliot reads his Four Quartets.” <https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ga8tQrG4ZSw> (November 27, 2015).Search in Google Scholar

Fischer-Lichte, Erika (1990). “Die Zeichensprache des Theaters: Zum Problem theatralischer Bedeutungsgenerierung.” Renate Möhrmann, ed. Theaterwissenschaft Heute: Eine Einführung. Berlin: Dietrich Reimer, 233–259.Search in Google Scholar

Fischer-Lichte, Erika (2012). Performativität: Eine Einführung. Bielefeld: transcript.10.14361/9783839411780Search in Google Scholar

Fujimura, Makoto (2009). Refractions: A Journey of Faith, Art, and Culture. Colorado Springs, CO: NavPress.Search in Google Scholar

Fujimura, Makoto (2012). “Refractions 37. From Ground Zero to Fujimura Farm.” <http://www.makotofujimura.com/writings/refractions-37-from-ground-zero-to-fujimura-farm/> (November 27, 2015).Search in Google Scholar

Fujimura, Makoto (2013a). “Bio.” <http://www.makotofujimura.com/bio> (November 27, 2015).Search in Google Scholar

Fujimura, Makoto (2013b). “Calendar. Event Archives.” <http://www.makotofujimura.com/calendar/archives/> (November 27, 2015).Search in Google Scholar

Fujimura, Makoto (2013c). On Becoming Generative: An Introduction to Culture Care. New York, NY: Fujimura Institute and International Arts Movement.Search in Google Scholar

Fujimura, Makoto (2015). “Easter at King’s Chapel, Cambridge.” <http://www.makotofujimura.com/writings/easter-at-kings-chapel-cambridge/> (November 27, 2015).Search in Google Scholar

Grant, Michael, ed. (1997). T.S. Eliot: The Critical Heritage. 2 vols. London and New York, NY: Routledge.Search in Google Scholar

Hays, Richard (2015). “Curriculum Vitae.” <https://divinity.duke.edu/sites/divinity.duke.edu/files/documents/cv/RBH%20vita%2011-5-13.pdf> (November 27, 2015).Search in Google Scholar

Herman, Bruce (2015). “Bio.” <http://www.bruceherman.com/bio/> (November 27, 2015).Search in Google Scholar

Holloway, John (1992). “Eliot’s Four Quartets and Beethoven’s Last Quartets.” Vinod Sena and Rajiva Verma, eds. The Fire and the Rose: New Essays on T.S. Eliot. Delhi et al.: Oxford University Press, 145–159.Search in Google Scholar

Howarth, Herbert (1957). “Eliot, Beethoven and J. W. N. Sullivan.” Comparative Literature 9.4, 322–332.10.2307/1768549Search in Google Scholar

Julian of Norwich (2006). Revelations of Divine Love. Roger Hudleston, ed. Mineola, NY: Dover Publications.Search in Google Scholar

Kenner, Hugh (1959). The Invisible Poet: T.S. Eliot. San Diego, CA: Harcourt, Brace and World.Search in Google Scholar

Kramer, Kenneth Paul (2007). Redeeming Time: T.S. Eliot’s Four Quartets. Lanham: Cowley Publications.Search in Google Scholar

McNelly Kearns, Cleo (1993). “Negative Theology and Literary Discourse in Four Quartets: A Derridean Reading.” Words in Time: New Essays on Eliot’s Four Quartets. Edward Loebb, ed. London: The Athlone Press, 131–157.Search in Google Scholar

Meyer, Kinereth and Rachel Salmon Deshen (2010). “Four Quartets and Wisdom Literature.” Reading the Underthought: Jewish Hermeneutics and the Christian Poetry of Hopkins and Eliot. Washington, DC: The Catholic University of America Press, 246–274.Search in Google Scholar

Moody, David A. (1992). “T.S. Eliot’s Passage to India.” Sena Verma and Rajiva Verma, eds. The Fire and the Rose: New Essays on T.S. Eliot. Delhi: Oxford University Press, 25–43.Search in Google Scholar

Novak, Julia (2011). Live Poetry: An Integrated Approach to Poetry in Performance. Amsterdam and New York, NY: Rodopi.10.1163/9789401206921Search in Google Scholar

QU4RTETS (2015). <http://www.gordon.edu/qu4rtets> (November 27, 2015).Search in Google Scholar

Reibetanz, Julia Maniates (1983). A Reading of Eliot’s Four Quartets. Ann Arbor, MI: UMI Research Press.Search in Google Scholar

Scott, Peter Dale (1994). “The Social Critic and his Discontents.” David A. Moody, ed. The Cambridge Companion to T. S. Eliot. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 60–76.10.1017/CCOL0521420806.005Search in Google Scholar

Sena, Vinod (1992). “The Lotos and the Rose: The Bhagavad Gita and T. S. Eliot’s Four Quartets.” Sena Verma and Rajiva Verma, eds. The Fire and the Rose: New Essays on T. S. Eliot. Delhi: Oxford University Press, 180–189.Search in Google Scholar

Spanos, William V. (1978). “Hermeneutics and Memory: Destroying T.S. Eliot’s Four Quartets.” Genre 11.4, 523–574.Search in Google Scholar

Spurr, Barry (2010). Anglo-Catholic in Religion: T.S. Eliot and Christianity. Cambridge: The Lutterworth Press.10.2307/j.ctt1cg4k5tSearch in Google Scholar

Theofanidis, Christopher (2008–2010). “Biography.” <http://www.theofanidismusic.com/download/THEOFANIDIS_resume.pdf> (November 27, 2015).Search in Google Scholar

Turner, Denys (2011). Julian of Norwich, Theologian. New Haven, CT and London: Yale University Press.Search in Google Scholar

Published Online: 2016-10-7
Published in Print: 2016-11-1

©2016 Walter de Gruyter GmbH, Berlin/Boston

Downloaded on 5.3.2026 from https://www.degruyterbrill.com/document/doi/10.1515/zaa-2016-0029/html
Scroll to top button