Sárospataki Füzetek 12. (2008)
2008 / 2. szám - TANULMÁNYOK - Frank Sawyer: A reading of T. S. Eliot's Ashwednesday
A READING OF T.S.ELIOT’sASH WEDNESDAY The charms of ‘distraction’ (fruit, colours, hair, flute music) are alternatives which can hold back spiritual progress.21 The holy colours are white and blue in this poem (as we shall also note in section four). The blue, green, and brown of part three are earthy colours, not the heavenly colours. ‘Lilac’ may be the colour or the fragrance and symbolizes past loves. It all adds up to the temptations of pleasures to lead us from the spiritual climb. Even the best attempts to integrate all aspects, material and spiritual, pleasures and duties, the enjoyable and the ethical - all such integration easily flounders on one side or the other. The poet holds forth the way of repentance and spiritual exercise; the way of the pilgrim, which must be light weight and not loaded down by the ‘cares of the world’. If we renounce ourselves for something greater, we must also renounce all that made us who we were. This is the ascetic line which must not be lost by following (only) the aesthetic enjoyments. However, in Christian doctrine, repentance must also be balanced by faith, hope, and love; and the joy of salvation should be balanced by the joy of creation. Even though catechisms rightly talk about ‘daily repentance’, this does not mean that every day is Ash-Wednesday. Eliot also knew that Ash- Wednesday and asceticism are not the whole story. It is a matter of turning in the right direction. Indeed, Ash-Wednesday is a step toward Good Friday, and also Easter Morning. The third section ends with a biblical reference to the words of humility found in Mathew 8:8 and used in the litany for Ash-Wednesday: “Lord, I am not worthy that thou shouldst come under my roof: but speak the word only, and my servant shall be healed” (King James Version). In liturgical reference and for Eliot, we may read: ‘but speak the word only and my soul shall be healed’. Part four Once again, ‘violet’ can refer to a flower or a colour. As a colour it is sometimes associated in religion with repentance, and as a flower with resurrection. There is also mention of ‘various ranks of varied green’, but all these references are bound together by ‘white and blue...Mary’s colour’. Even the singular of ‘Mary’s colour’ is interesting, since apparently the white and blue are one pattern of harmony for the poet. To understand this section we need to imagine a nun-like figure silently symbolizing redemption in a garden setting. The continued reference to a female person brings associations of Beatrice, Mary, but also Eliot’s wife Vivienne. Further, as his wife was hospitalized because of her psychological condition, the reference to ‘sister’ could mean a nurse, and so there is a private meaning in the symbols for Eliot as he struggles with redemption, in the double sense of seeking healing in this life and beyond. The ‘silent sister veiled’ refers to religious persons such as nuns, but could also refer to mourning. We must also realize that some have spoken of the veiling of truth and this was often personalized as Lady Philosophy (the 21 There is a reference here again to Dante, which includes the ‘third stairs’ and sensuality as a misleading force. Cf. Herbert, op.cit., 44. 75
