Eliot is a fantastic poet. The poems in the Quartets have as much merit in their aural imprints as in their physical words. Those who claim to appreciate good poetry would do well to read his work. ( )

Perhaps the greatest spiritual poem of the 20th century. ( )

Perhaps the greatest spiritual poem of the 20th century. ( )

Perhaps the greatest spiritual poem of the 20th century. ( )

I read this book two and a half times. While I enjoyed some passages, most recalled to me an image of a man talking to himself in a rambling manner. Maybe it's because I don't have Eliot's education. I don't think it's possible to know everything Eliot knew and then also that Pluto is no longer a planet, for example. Too much means nothing if you don't know what Eliot is meaning, and I'm a firm follower of the cult of 'at least -something- has to be intelligible if the reader is not a Ph.D in the classics!'

In an effort to understand a little better I took a look at some of the annotations made by various Eliot scholars. It didn't help. Maybe later I'll take another jab at understanding this work, but for now I'm satisfied to say that whatever inspiration I might manage to mine out of it isn't worth the exertion of the mining. ( )