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Master Sage
Archie here! Today’s meditation on Literature comes from the beginning of the 20th Century, from a poet and essayist that changed the way we think about literature itself. I am, of course, referring to the “master of verse” himself, Thomas Stearns Eliot. In this discussion, I want to revisit his essay on “Tradition and the Individual Talent,” published in 1919. The reason why this was so important is because it laid the groundwork for two things:
1. It gave new writers an excellent mindset to start successful careers
2. It provided a framework to judge the value of literature.
And as I will further point out, beneath Eliot’s arguments we find a key to living a truly meaningful life.
To begin, this is one of the more studied paragraphs of his essay:
“The poet must be very conscious of the main current… He must be aware that the mind of Europe – the mind of his own country is a mind which he learns in time to be much more important than his own private mind… The poet has not a ‘personality’ to express, but a particular medium… in which impressions and experiences combine in peculiar and unexpected ways. Impressions and experiences which are important for the man may take no place in the poetry, and those which become important in the poetry may play quite a negligible part in the man, the personality… What happens [to the poet] is a continual surrender of himself as he is at the moment to something which is more valuable. The progress of an artist is a continual self-sacrifice, a continual extinction of personality.”
Now the ideas in this excerpt served to encapsulate much of the New Criticism and Modern Literary Theory we have come to know today. Up until the beginning of the 20th century there was a tendency towards Literary Humanism, a celebration of the author and his or her ambitions.
But Eliot’s piece stands in stark contrast from this thinking, instead advocating for New Criticism in two different ways. First, he explains the concept of a “Great Tradition” of literature that must be appreciated and adhered to. He then describes the notion of self-sacrifice to this Great Tradition, a concept that is often today referred to as “death of the author.” I’m going to go over how these two concepts relate to each other, and how using this analytical lens can be of benefit to you.
The “Great Tradition” of Literature
New Critical Theorists argue that some texts are superior to others, and that the best among these is called literature. Such texts, when brought together, have a sense of order, harmony, and unity. They add up to form a coherent statement about the world, a tradition of addressing universal issues in writing that stretches all the way back to people etching on rocks in Mesopotamia. Each era in history needs authors to continue this tradition, to produce great texts that speak for their generation.
Texts that don’t do this are considered too narrow, too simple, and too personal. That is why, when analyzing literature, our understanding of meaning should not be based on the author’s intention, psychological state, or personal life. That doesn’t matter. What matters is the text itself, and how many ways we can interpret it in relation to the greater, overarching issues addressed in mankind’s literary tradition.
“The Cocktail Party” of Literature.
The best way I know to explain how this great tradition applies to you is to put yourself in Eliot’s shoes. One of his most popular plays was a comedy called “The Cocktail Party.” So just for the fun of it, imagine that you’ve been invited to a prestigious cocktail mixer in London. You make your way into the study of this grand old estate, the walls filled to the brim with meticulous detail, not to mention the opulence of the guests. It is a humbling experience. Clearly no expense was spared.
In the middle of the room, you find a group of gentleman standing in a big circle. Each of them is taking turns discussing important issues of the day. Here you are, the up in coming participant in this conversation. Would your first impulse be to blurt out some uninformed thoughts on a random topic of your choice? Good luck with that. It’d be far more appropriate to listen to the conversation for a while and gather an intelligent thought to add to a topic already in place. Perhaps you could start with an affirmation or a rebuttal? This would help you establish yourself from the get-go as someone who actually knows what he’s talking about.
We can think of the Great Tradition of literature in the same manner. Eliot is admonishing young and upcoming authors to study a great deal of it, to get in touch with the “mind of Europe,” the long history of works that came before them. When they do so, they will come to find that their contribution (at least initially) will be trivial by comparison, and that they are simply a “medium” by which this tradition continues. This, in turn, leads to a surrendering of the self. The author gives up his personality and ego in order to speak instead for his generation. This is a key point in his ideas, that if a person is to write serious literature, it must connect to the traditions of old and not be narrowed to the author’s personal experience. Only in this way can an artist “progress” towards greatness.
This is important because remember, as an author, you are trying to resonate with your audience, correct? Then naturally you would want to know the current scope of literature, to see what has already resonated with people. In this great tradition you will find powerful archetypes and themes from which to draw your stories, observations, and critiques.
As a Reader of Literature
What does this imply then, for a person who is reading that author’s text? If the author didn’t view it as personal, neither should the reader right? One should instead look straight to the text, and in doing so he will come to better understand not only that text but the world around him and even himself. This is called “death of the author.” The author’s importance in understanding a text is moot, as he has sacrificed himself to the greater forces at work.
Hence, when people would go up to Robert Frost and ask him what the meaning of his poetry was, he would simply respond “If I wanted you to know, I would have told you in the poem.” This is exactly what New Critics believe, that the author isn’t important in the readers’ understanding of meaning. The author is, in fact, just another reader of his own text once it is published.
So what do New Critics analyze to determine the interpretation and value of a particular work? Well, often they break a text down into different interpretive lenses, such as discussing Marxist economic themes at play in how the characters interact, or psycho-analytic interpretations of what’s going on in the characters’ minds, or reflecting on feminist/gender issues, etc. Different texts will call for varying levels of analysis. “Jane Eyre,” for example, has a lot to say from a feminist perspective, whereas “The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde” is much more powerful when interpreted through a Freudian lens. The basic point is that great writing will inevitably draw on fundamental themes that transcend both the text and the author that wrote it.
Conclusion
I have always interpreted Eliot’s essay as having an application beyond literature, because he uses such big terms as “the main current,” the “mind of Europe,” and the “mind of his own country.” He speaks of these “minds” as being “much more important than our own private mind.” What he seems to be referring to is the zeitgeist, the spiritus mundi, what Carl Jung called the collective unconscious. And this collective mind, much like our own minds, didn’t simply come from nothing. It has resulted from millennia of discourse.
As Sages, we must first take in the discourse, and then contribute to it. This is, as far as I can tell, what gives life a tremendous amount of meaning, as well as the ability to transcend itself. In the end, your life may only be thought of in the context of your contribution towards the great traditions of mankind. Think of names like Hannibal Barca, Alexander the Great, and Napoleon Bonaparte, people who contributed a great deal to military history. Others such as Isaac Newton, Madame Curie, and Albert Einstein added to scientific thought. T.S. Eliot himself contributed to modern poetry and prose.
Now here’s the question you’ve been waiting for. How will YOU contribute to the Great Tradition of mankind? Find your niche, find your passion, find your motivation, and get to work!
So what do you think?
Please share your thoughts below! What are some of your favorite works from T.S. Eliot? What Great Tradition will you be contributing to?
From Athens’ forum to ours. Live wisely my friends.
Archie the Sage