Great piece The Imaginative Conservative about the recent reissuance of Russell Kirk's Eliot and His Age. This is one of the few books of Kirk's I haven't read. I was able to write my essay biography of him without it, and when I eventually went to pick it up, I couldn't get into it for some reason. This essay stirs me to try it again.
"Eliot and His Age is a big and thorÂough book that exÂamÂines the toÂtalÂity of Eliot's viÂsion. Kirk blends in his commentary all those elÂeÂments that are the root-subÂstance of a poet's viÂsion–the creÂative and the critÂiÂcal, the litÂerÂary and the social, the poÂlitÂiÂcal and the ecoÂnomic, the reÂliÂgious and the philoÂsophÂiÂcal. If all these elÂeÂments are to be elucidated, the critic who fulÂfills his true reÂsponÂsiÂbilÂity must posÂsess the hisÂtorÂiÂcal sense and also esÂtabÂlish connections proportionately. The posÂsesÂsion of these critÂiÂcal propÂerÂties helps to deÂfine the exÂcluÂsiveÂness of the critic's function and to make that funcÂtion perÂtiÂnent to the meanÂing of civÂiÂlizaÂtion and the desÂtiny of man. The critic, no less than the creÂator, who views the world as an orÂganic whole, enÂables us to unÂderÂstand the world in all of its manifestations. He enÂables us, as Eliot once obÂserved, “to see beÂneath both beauty and ugÂliÂness; to see the boreÂdom, and the horÂror and the glory.” Such a critic is more than a critic; he is a man of letÂters who, as Ralph Waldo EmerÂson wrote, 'has drawn the white lot in life.'"
