In my beginning is my end. 1

Eliot’s second quartet begins in East Coker, a small village in the English countryside; an insignificant place, perhaps, but not for T.S. Eliot. Rulo referred to the village as “a place of beginnings and a place of endings.” It signifies where the Eliot lineage’s “time in England ended and their time in America began,” as Eliot’s ancestors originally hailed from the village. Postmortem, the village continued to play its role as one of both beginnings and endings: “If you go to the St. Michael's Parish Church today in East Coker, there’ll be a plaque on the wall... below that plaque are the ashes of T.S. Eliot,” Rulo said. 

It is the testimony of East Coker that helps scholars address the contentious question of Eliot's identity as either American poet or English poet; he is inseparably both. 

The poetry does not matter. 71

While reading “East Coker,” certain nuances make it apparent that Eliot is “more self-aware than he has ever been of his limitations as a poet.” He is making criticisms of the written word and its restrictions on expression, but ironically does so through his poetry. He uses material words to cast off the material. While writing, he appears aware of the things he can do well and the things he cannot. Rulo recognized this to be somewhat unique, and a reality that Eliot was maybe “not so aware of in his earlier stages as a poet.” His awareness of his limitations only enhanced the quality of his craft, allowing him to critique his own use of language as he was actively utilizing it. 

“East Coker” was widely read when Eliot first wrote it. Thus, despite Eliot’s verse to the contrary, the poetry did matter to a great deal of people. The secular popularity of the poem concerned Eliot based on Rulo’s comment: “‘East Coker’ was so popular that [Eliot] questioned whether or not it was any good.’” 

O dark dark dark. They all go into the dark 101

Ph.D. alumnus of Catholic University Dr. Christopher Petter provided significant commentary on “the darkness,” which holds a weighty presence in Part III of “East Coker.” Although Eliot is dwelling on the darkness, these verses are “angled to offer more than lamentation.” Eliot’s diction reveals a connection to the apophatic tradition of theology, one that refers to God’s greatness in terms of what it is not. This, Petter reasons, is the language deployed by Eliot. “The experience of darkness is, for Eliot, transformative.” It is Eliot’s repetition of the darkness that suggests this transformative quality. The darkness is not merely something Eliot is witnessing, observing, critiquing. He is in it.

“He’s attacking himself and is never outside the bounds of the satire...It’s a critique of himself,” Rulo said. 

But how did Eliot end up in the darkness in the first place? “East Coker” was written at a time when Eliot was experiencing a failed marriage and was in love with another woman. He’d only been happy twice in his life: (1) in his childhood and (2) when he met his wife Valery toward the end of his life. “Everything in between was darkness,” Rulo said. 

The dripping blood our only drink 168

It is the fourth part of “East Coker” that provides the strongest evidence for the poem’s classification as one of the great Christian poems of the 20th century. Eliot establishes a tension in his poetry; he is “somewhere between lyric and philosophy. It’s important that it’s somewhere in between,” Petter said. 

Eliot utilizes language and imagery associated with the Passion of Christ, with phrases such as wounded surgeon, paternal care, purgatorial fires, blood our only drink, flesh our only food, we call this Friday good. The poem, already an established litany of endings and beginnings, draws a divine parallel in Part IV: in Christ’s end lies salvation’s beginning. 

In my end is my beginning. 215

The discussion ended with Dr. Petter’s reflection on reading “East Coker,” a poem about a small, perhaps insignificant, village in the English countryside: “This is a poem that I live with and read, at various times, again and again. It seems, to me, the way it must be read. A necessity of repetition in order to move deeper into the mystery of the poem.”

November 2021