“Where prayer has been valid”: T. S. Eliot's Four Quartets and the lyrical dimension of the analytic space

Abstract

This paper is an attempt to demonstrate the power and meaning of human lyricism by the only means that can really do so—lyricism itself. Using a fresh reading of T. S. Eliot's Four Quartets (Eliot, 1944), the author demonstrates the lyrical attitude Eliot himself offers us as a way to observe the world. This lyrical attitude, which the author believes is a vital component of the analytic presence, will be presented here as a unique kind of integration between the predictable and explicable—and that which is inexplicable and sometimes even unknowable.

Keywords:

• Analytic
• attitude
• lyricism
• poetry
• T. S. Eliot

Notes

1. In contrast to Gilead, I am considering “possible” and “actual” as two categories within the mind itself.