East Coker (poem)
It was finished during early 1940 and printed in the UK in the Easter edition of the 1940 New English Weekly, and in the US in the May 1940 issue of Partisan Review.
[8] The time theme is stated in the first section as "In my beginning is my end" which, given proper attention, might prove to lead into the eternal moment.
The first section reflects on how things rise, fall, and are reborn, drawing on images of countryside houses built and destroyed, of rural life, seasons, traditional rituals, music and dance, and honoring the dead to evoke the passage of time.
[9][10] The fourth, which is a formal section, deploys a series of Baroque paradoxes in the context of the Good Friday mass.
One such paradox is the "wounded surgeon", a Christ-like figure who heals through painful interventions, within a "hospital" that encompasses "the whole Earth".
The fourth section contemplates humanity's need to endure suffering and purification to find oneness, spiritual healing, renewal and salvation, evoking intense imagery of blood.
[9][10] This past manner of paradoxes is regarded ironically by the poet in the fifth section as he looks back on his period of experimentation in "the years of l'entre deux guerres" as "largely wasted".
The poet encourages spiritual exploration, especially for older people, suggesting that true understanding comes from embracing both stillness and movement.
"[9][10] East Coker gives a message of hope that the English communities would survive through World War II.
[14] In a letter dated 9 February 1940, Eliot stated, "We can have very little hope of contributing to any immediate social change; and we are more disposed to see our hope in modest and local beginnings, than in transforming the whole world at once... We must keep alive aspirations which can remain valid throughout the longest and darkest period of universal calamity and degradation.
In particular, Stephen Spender claimed that "the war modified [Eliot's] attitude by convincing him that there was a Western cause to be positively defended.
[11] The poem describes society in ways similar to The Waste Land, especially with its emphasis on death and dying.
In the second part of the poem, nature is experiencing disorder, and it is suggested that humans too may burn, and also that reason, knowledge, and science cannot save people.
Dante argues that old men are supposed to return to God and describes the process in a way similar to the travels of Odysseus.
Both Dante and Eliot put forth a similar view to Augustine of Hippo when they focus on internal travels.
[22] According to Eliot the poetic aspects of the poem are grounded in the tradition of John Cleveland, Edward Benlowes, William Blake, and W. B. Yeats's early work.
[11] In terms of theology, Eliot is orthodox in his theory and relies primarily on the writings of St Augustine.
[21] Besides the many literary sources, Eliot also draws on his personal feelings and experience, especially on the great stress that he felt while composing the poem.
In the Southern Review, James Johnson Sweeney, Spring 1941, and Curist Bradford, Winter 1944, discussed paraphrases of the poems[which?]
