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Dove Descending: A Journey into T.S. Eliot's Four Quartets (Sapientia Classics)

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The Negative Way
LOOKING FOR A CHALLENGE?

Dove Descending: A Journey into T.S. Eliot's Four Quartets (Sapientia Classics)
Thomas Howard
Manufacturer: Ignatius Press
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

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Four Quartets
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ASIN: 1586170406

Book Description

Throughout the world, many consider T.S. Eliot to be the most important and influential poet of the 20th century, and Four Quartets to be his finest poem and greatest literary achievement. Dove Descending is a journey into the beauties and depths of Eliot's masterpiece written by Thomas Howard, bestselling author, professor and critic. In this line-by-line commentary, Howard unravels the complexities of the sublime poem with such adept adroitness that even its most difficult passages spring to life. During his many years as a professor of English and Literature, Howard taught this poem often, and developed what he calls "a reading" approach to its concepts that render their meaning more lucid for the reader. Dove Descending reunites the brilliant insights of a master teacher whose understanding and love of Eliot's writings are shared here for the great benefit of the reader. "T.S. Eliot's greatest poem deserves the finest exposition. Few critics alive today are equal to the task. Thomas Howard is one of those gifted few. Lovers of Eliot will delight in Howard's understanding of the mysterious descending of the dove."

—Joseph Pearce

Author, Literary Converts

Customer Reviews:

The Negative Way.......2006-04-13

This is the first book I've found in the "Sapientia Classics" imprint from Ignatius Press (sapientia means wisdom), although at least one other title, Shakespeare the Papist is also out. T.S. Eliot, widely regarded as a (perhaps "the") modernist poet, was an anglo-Catholic. The anglo part has gotten much commentary; here the Catholic side comes into play.

Thomas Howard has essentially written a companion for Eliot's poetry cycle, "The Four Quartets," designed to be read alongside the poem(s)so one needs a copy of the poem to read along with this book. But many readers also find Howard daunting because of his large vocabulary (see On Being Catholic or Chance or the Dance), so one may also want a dictionary handy. Neither Howard's book nor Eliot's poem(s) are as hard to understand as George William Rutler's introduction, however, which is filled with brilliant insights and bon mots but--wink wink--assumes we have a lot of inside information on all things modernist and Eliotelian.

Thankfully Howard doesn't do that; rather he draws us in by drawing out the poem(s), which he finds is (are) about what Charles Williams called the via negativa or the negative way. You can find it in The Cloud of Unknowing or St. John of the Cross' dark night of the soul (an experience post-modernists readily relate to), but Howard finds it most of all in C.S. Lewis' friend and fellow Inkling, Charles Williams.

That's rather natural since Eliot and Williams were friends and Eliot wrote an introduction to Williams' novel, All Hallows Eve. Howard, who refers to Williams here and there throughout this book also authored The Novels of Charles Williams and took the book's title from Williams' The Descent of the Dove: A History of the Holy Spirit in the Church. Not that you need to read CW to understand Eliot or Howard, both of whom do a good job explaining and invoking the way of negation. But Williams also wrote of another way, the way of affirmation. Howard proves a faithful guide to both writers so that readers interested in both ways, having closed Dove Descending may move seamlessly to The Novels of Charles Williams.

LOOKING FOR A CHALLENGE?.......2006-03-24

Nothing anybody might say will prepare you for this book, a pilgrimage in itself--and most excellent Lenten reading. Eliot hated footnotes, so that's all I have to say.
Robert Bove
www.RobertBove.net

Indivisible by Four : A String Quartet in Pursuit Of Harmony

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A Good Read for Any Musician
Great read
divisible by four
Bravo, Arnold Steinhardt!
Insightful and touching

Indivisible by Four : A String Quartet in Pursuit Of Harmony
Arnold Steinhardt
Manufacturer: Farrar, Straus and Giroux
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover

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ASIN: 0374236704

Amazon.com

Chamber-music lovers will rejoice in this story of the formation, nurturing, and maturing of the Guarneri String Quartet. First violinist Arnold Steinhardt has written a delightful memoir that radiates the love of music and sense of mutual respect and affection that have kept the Guarneri's players together since the ensemble was founded in 1964. How a famous, extremely busy musician learned to write so well is a mystery, but Steinhardt's style is as engaging and captivating as his playing. After sketching his own and his colleagues' pre-quartet careers, he describes how they choose and rehearse their repertoire and how they resolve their inevitable disagreements--and he even throws light on the inexplicable magic that happens in performance. Steinhardt recounts the pleasures and hardships of traveling and the group's partnership with illustrious guests (notably pianist Artur Rubinstein); he tells musical and personal anecdotes, wryly poking fun at himself and others, but never saying a malicious or derogatory word about anyone. Most remarkably, his discussions of a score are illuminating without becoming too technical. Steinhardt describes the emotional impact of music with a strikingly felicitous, often poetic touch, yet his characterizations resonate with his own experience and avoid the overblown or extravagant. Though it helps to know the music he feels so strongly about, this is a book anyone can enjoy. --Edith Eisler

Book Description

The Guarneri Quartet is fabled for its unique longevity and high-spirited virtuosity. Here is its story from the inside--a story filled with drama, humor, danger, compassion, and, of course, glorious music.

A player who studies and performs the exalted string-quartet repertoire has opted for a very special life. Arnold Steinhardt, tracing his own development as a student, orchestra player, and budding young soloist, gives a touching account of how he and his intrepid colleagues were converted to chamber music despite the daunting odds against success. And he reveals, as no one has before, the intensely difficult process by which--on the battlefield of daily three-hour rehearsals--four individualists master and then overcome the confining demands of ensemble playing.

Customer Reviews:

A Good Read for Any Musician.......2007-03-10

I would recommend this book for any musician, especially a member of an ensemble. This book gives a good insight of the personal dynamics between the members and why they have been successful and together for so many years.

Great read.......2007-01-14

Fantastic read for any instrumentalist, especially if youve played in any type of small ensemble.Highly recommended.

divisible by four.......2007-01-10

excellent study of the dynamics of a string quartet, or any group of individuals working for a single goal.

Bravo, Arnold Steinhardt!.......2004-11-27

This wonderfully humorous and true-to-the-art book is sweet music to anyone who loves chamber music. Steinhardt gets it so right throughout this delightful book, I, like many of the other reviewers was disappointed when I reached the last page - I wanted it to keep on going...

Steinhardt hits a universal chord that will resonate particularly well with those "insiders" who have performed chamber music at any level. While reading it, I found myself digging into my CDs and listening to the piece the author was describing. The unique commentary accompanied by the performance brought me a new appreciation for the string quartet genre.

Insightful and touching.......2004-09-04

I wish this book would have had twice as many pages, at the least. I found it utterly impossible to put down, raced through it in barely two days, and now feel bereft for having reached the end. Fortunately, the Guarneri's themselves are still going strong, though cellist David Soyer made way a few years ago for his pupil Peter Wiley. This book deals with the (many) years before that change took place. Arnold Steinhardt is as engrossing a storyteller as he is a violinist, and addresses the multitude of issues, both musical and personal, connected with string quartet playing without ever being boring, pompous, or academic. On the contrary, his lively, often humorous style of writing and the uncompromisingly personal tone he adopts prove perfect vehicles for an in-depth look at the daunting challenges involved in playing the quartet repertoire, but are also highly endearing. By the end you feel you truly got to know these players; an additional reason why the extensive description concluding the book, of a 90's performance of Schubert's Death & The Maiden, interspersed with Steinhardt's musings on the eventual finiteness even of the long-lived Guarneri Quartet, is extremely moving. The focus on such well-known repertoire, by the way, (Beethoven's op. 59/3 and the Cavatina from op. 130 are other Steinhardt favourites) are typical of the accessibility of the book and its laudable lack of snobbery.
Before these final pages, the author offers anything from concert-tour anecdotes, string quartet gags and quartet psychology to insights into the rehearsal process, repertoire choice, musical history, the peculiarities of amateurs, as well as thoughts on the relative merits of recorded and "live" performances. Deftly drafted portraits of musical giants like, say, Georg Szell or Arthur Rubinstein add further interest; the brief appearance of Jacqueline Du Pré as a "pale milkmaid in a flowerprint dress" who then incongruously attacks her cello with animal-like abandon I found quite unforgettable.
In all, I would strongly recommend this book to anyone interested in chamber music; but it will be a special treat for those with some experience in quartet-playing (if only by pointing out that string quartet repertoire is hard even for players of Guarneri-stature...).

T.S. Eliot Reads: The Wasteland, Four Quartets and Other Poem

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Eliot reads Eliot

T.S. Eliot Reads: The Wasteland, Four Quartets and Other Poem
T.S. Eliot
Manufacturer: Caedmon
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Audio Cassette

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ASIN: 0694522767
Release Date: 2000-04-25

Book Description

The Poems:

The Wasteland
The Hollow Men
Journey of the Magi from the Ariel Poems
La Figlia che Piange
Landscape: New Hampshite, Virginia, Usk, Rannoch, by Glencoe, Cape Ann
Morning at the Window
Difficulties of a Statesman from Coriolan
Sweeney Among the Nightingales
Whispers of Immortality
Macavity: the Mystery Cat
The Four Quartets
Ash Wednesday
A Song for the Simeon from the Ariel poems
Marina from the Ariel poems
Triumphal March from Coriolan
O Light Invisible, from The Rock
The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock
Portrait of a Lady
Preludes
Mr. Eliot's Sunday Morning Service
Murder in the Cathederal: Part II, Opening Chorus
The Family Reunion: Part II, A Chorus

Customer Reviews:

Eliot reads Eliot.......2005-10-10

A. Walton Litz was right on the money after listening to Eliot read his "Waste Land," saying Eliot was essentially a dramatist. Why his poetry takes so well with those who normally don't read poetry. This selection is the most comprehensive of his live and studio recordings. Includes his experimental "Triumphal March from Coriolan" but does not include his brilliant but never-completed play "Sweeney Agonistes" (a play whose truncated rhythm, epilitism, and pauses proceeded both Beckett and Pinter by decades.)

In any case, how can we resist Eliot reciting in his own voice the lines:

"I was neither at the hot gates
Nor fought in the warm rain
Nor knee deep in the salt marsh, heaving a cutlass,
Bitten by flies, fought."

The Waste Land, Four Quartets and Other Poems/2-Audio Cassettes

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The Waste Land, Four Quartets and Other Poems/2-Audio Cassettes
T.S. Eliot , and Alec Guinness
Manufacturer: Newman Communications
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Audio Cassette

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ASIN: 0886909910

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All art ... approaches the condition of music.
Four Quartets
T.S. Eliot for Sikhs
The Warrior and the God: T.S.Eliot and The Four Quartets
Eliot's greatest and final poetic acheivement

Four Quartets
T. S. Eliot
Manufacturer: Harvest Books
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

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Dove Descending: A Journey into T.S. Eliot's Four Quartets (Sapientia Classics)
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ASIN: 0156332256

Amazon.com

Published in the fiery days of World War II, Four Quartets stands as a testament to the power of poetry amid the chaos of the time. Let the words speak for themselves: "The dove descending breaks the air/With flame of incandescent terror/Of which the tongues declare/The only discharge from sin and error/The only hope, or the despair/Lies in the choice of pyre or pyre--/To be redeemed from fire by fire./Who then devised this torment?/Love/Love is the unfamiliar Name/Behind the hands that wave/The intolerable shirt of flame/Which human power cannot remove./We only live, only suspire/Consumed by either fire or fire."

Book Description

The last major verse written by the Nobel laureate, including “Burnt Norton,” “East Coker,” “The Dry Salvages,” and “Little Gidding.”

Customer Reviews:

All art ... approaches the condition of music........2006-06-20

Among all these reviews, not one comes to terms with the very title of this opus: Four Quartets. When was Eliot anything but precise in his choice of word?

The inspiration for these poems -- or reflections -- are the late string quartets of Beethoven, those numbered from 12 through 16. It is the 5-movement No.15 in A Minor,Op.132, that seems to have exerted the strongest influence, with it's famous adagio movement, which Beethoven inscribed as the thanksgiving song of a convalescent.

Actually, No.15 was the 13th in order, but the Quartets were published out of sequence, which was not uncommon in Beethoven's time. The Late Quartets progress from the classic 4-movement No.12 and add a movement to each work up to the 7-movement Op.131 in C-sharp Minor. The 16th and final quartet returns to the classic 4-movement form. There is an expansion of form concluding with a contraction and return over the course of 5 works.

Like Eliot's Four Quartets, Beethoven's Late Quartets reflect upon time and faith -- and the 'speech' is often plain: repeated phrases that appear stuck in a groove, hammered chords, cheap tunes that seem to be lifted from a band in a local inn; from long-breathed melodies that look beyond what Wagner and Mahler will eventually bring to music, to cell-like motivs not heard again till Bartok and Webern.

The 'learned' aspect of Eliot's verse can lead us astray, so that we are forever parsing the meaning of the lines. I am taken with the sounds he makes as I read the poems aloud, and the sounds he chose to convey what the poems mean are, in a sense, the essence of meaning. From the first I was struck by the sheer sound of 'time' in the context of these Quartets, which are Eliot's swan song.

Four Quartets.......2005-09-21

This is a tiny book, more like a pamphlet, only 58 pages long with large print and some blank pages as part of the design. But it is mighty in its impact. These "four quartets" are four of T. S. Eliot's poems meditating (among other things) on the nature of time - time past, time present, time future...If you are of my generation and have read the poems before, you might love carrying this little book around just to dip into it for a line or two, and maybe understand something you never understood before. (T. S. Eliot is not always an easy read.) If you have never read them before, I envy you!

T.S. Eliot for Sikhs.......2005-01-04

I am a deeply religious Sikh living in America. The Four Quartets is to me a shining example of a man of deep understanding of God and reality. I have read this poem many times since I first read it back in college. It speaks directly to my soul. There is no passage, no phrase, which does not work for me.

I read some sections to my wife when we were first married, and she thought that it was an English translation of the Sikh holy texts.

"We shall not cease from exploration
And the end of all our exploring
Will be to arrive where we started
And know the place for the first time"

There is no better explanation of Eastern religion than this. I am eternally grateful for this work.

The Warrior and the God: T.S.Eliot and The Four Quartets.......2004-10-29

There is a line in Section III of "The Dry Salvages" that has bothered people: "I sometimes wonder if that is what Krishna meant--" as perhaps being too overdone, or even unnecessary to the poem...but, the dialogue between Krishna and Arjuna does give some insight into Eliot's comments on time and reality...when Arjuna is faced with the possibility of killing his own relatives in the opposing army, he can't handle it...Krishna then tells him that it doesn't matter....because of the immortal aspect of The Atman (man's inner spirit) which is not touched by our reality....no one really dies and so, only the doing is important:"Realize that pleasure and pain, gain and loss, victory and defeat, are all one and the same." And so, in relation to the poem, Time is looked at in much the same way...We have the illusion of leaving and arriving: "You are not the same people who left that station Or who will arrive at any Terminus"...it doesn't matter what you think or your regard for the fruits of your actions...the only important duty is to make the trip: "Not fare well,/but fare forward, voyagers." Being in the flow of time, living moment to moment, doing what is necessary is all....perhaps, at the quantum level, as another reviewer has suggested: normal perceptions are topsy-turvey, we're in the rabbit hole and if we can see that, then:"...the way up is the way down, the way forward is the/way back./You cannot face it steadlly, but this thing is sure,/That time is no healer:the patient is no longer here." When the insight is achieved, time disappears, all duality vanished and you are left with that still point of consciousness only seeming to act...so, what the hell?: "Fare forward." or as Krishna would put it: "That which is non-existent can never come into being and that which is can never cease to be."----Don Hildenbrand/Eugene, OR., USA

Eliot's greatest and final poetic acheivement.......2003-08-25

FOUR QUARTETS marks T.S. Eliot's crowning acheivement as a poet. It is the last substantial poetry he wrote before turning to drama and consists of four poems each with a five-part structure. The work as a whole is concerned with the perception of time, linked with the importance of poetic art and the place of Christianity in deciphering the meaning of one's lifetime.

After two quotations from Heraclitus, "Burnt Norton" opens the collection. Here Eliot muses on the idea that all possible outcomes of any event are secretly around us, unseen and unperceived. An empty pool is, in some other reality, filled with water and a blooming lotus. Eliot's metaphysical insight here is reminiscent of quantum theory that was then beginning to become the rage in physics circles. These speculations are tricky and difficult to get one's head around, and even more difficult to plainly put into words, but Eliot manages to succeed.

"East Coker", named after the town in England from where Eliot's Puritan ancestor emigrated to America, deals with the cyclical nature of time. Here the poet surveys the tendency for all earthly things to rise and ultimately fall. Christianity with its emphasis on eternal life, asserts Eliot, promises a way to change one's end to one's beginning and escape the fall into oblivion that dooms everything.

"The Dry Salvages", in reference to a place on the New England shore which Eliot visited as a youth, is the weak point of the collection. A rumination with a nautical theme, the poem suffers from meandering phrasing and peculiar wording. Its Marian devotion is inconsistent with the Puritan/Anglican tradition of the rest of FOUR QUARTETS. Most would attack "The Dry Salvages" for its oft-maligned line "I sometimes wonder if this is what Krishna meant", seen by some as overly haugty intellectualism. I think this is unfair, and in fact the section which that line begins is the one bit that redeems the poem. Eliot's Harvard education, where he first became familiar with Eastern thought, was 30 years in the past, but the subject still preoccupied him in this poem.

"Little Gidding" superbly ends FOUR QUARTETS. It was written in the height of the Blitz, a time of fear and doubt in England, but it counters Hitler's madness with a note of hope and spiritual triumph. Eliot calls back to an earlier conflict, England's Civil War, and seeks any lesson it might teach his generation. "The communication of the dead," he writes, "is tongued with fire beyond the language of the living." As the poem ends, he has acheived inner peace in a time of pandemonium, through the realisation that the pain of the present is escapable by reaching to the past - what poets have done before - and the future - what is still left to be written.

FOUR QUARTETS is a complicated and vast work. While not as full of obvious quotations as his earlier, more popular work "The Waste Land", it does work in inspiration and material from Christian thinkers such as St. John of the Cross and Julian of Norwich, and contains many illusions to 17th century England. As a result, the work is incredibly deep and one can find something new with each reading. But FOUR QUARTETS is also an entertaining work for the casual reader. A combination of smooth and engaging sound with the great themes of all time is a remarkable combination. Eliot's greatest work, I'd wholeheartedly recommend it.

The "Wasteland and "Four Quartets" (BBC Radio Collection)

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The "Wasteland and "Four Quartets" (BBC Radio Collection)
T.S. Eliot
Manufacturer: BBC Audiobooks
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Library Binding

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Dove Descending: A Journey into T.S. Eliot's Four Quartets (Sapientia Classics)
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ASIN: 0563523352

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Four Quartets
T.S. ELIOT
Manufacturer: Faber & Faber
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover

Complete String Quartets Transcribed for Four-Hand Piano (Series II)

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Complete String Quartets Transcribed for Four-Hand Piano (Series II)
Ludwig van Beethoven
Manufacturer: Dover Publications
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

Symphonies Nos. 6-9 for Piano Four Hands
A Midsummer Night's Dream for Piano Four Hands
Complete Brandenburg Concertos Transcribed for Piano Four Hands
Preparatory Exercises in Score Reading (Vorbereitende Ubungen im Partiturlesen)
Symphonies Nos. 1-5 for Piano Four Hands

ASIN: 0486239756

Book Description

Today’s four-hand pianists will greatly enjoy the later string quartets of Beethoven—some of the finest compositions in western music—in these excellent, faithful transcriptions. Included are Opp. 74, 95, 127, 130-133, 135. For piano students (at intermediate level) and seasoned performers. Originally published by C. F. Peters.

Redeeming Time: T.S. Eliot's Four Quartets

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Redeeming Time: T.S. Eliot's Four Quartets
Kenneth Paul Kramer
Manufacturer: Cowley Publications
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

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Dove Descending: A Journey into T.S. Eliot's Four Quartets (Sapientia Classics)
Four Quartets
A Reader's Guide to T.S. Eliot: A Poem-By-Poem Analysis (Reader's Guides)
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T.S. Eliot: An Imperfect Life

ASIN: 1561012858

Book Description

This exploration of T. S. Eliot's last major poem, Four Quartets, examines the poem's potential to transform readers' faith journeys. Kramer shows that the power of Four Quartets is its ability to create a dynamic interaction between the poem and the reader that promotes a genuine connection with the natural world, with others, and with the Divine.

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The Waste Land & Four Quartets
T. S. Eliot
Manufacturer: Sound Library
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Audio CD

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