Dove Descending: A Journey Into T.S. Eliot's Four Quartets

by Thomas Howard

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. Dove Descending "In my own view, this sequence of four poems represents the pinnacle of Eliot's whole work. Four Quartets stands as Eliot's valedictory to the modern world. I would place it, along with Chartres Cathedral, the Divine Comedy, van Eyck's "Adoration of the Mystic Lamb" and Mozart's Requiem as a major edifice in the history of the Christian West."
ùThomas Howard

Genres: Poetry, Nonfiction, Philosophy, Classics, Books About Books, Theology, Criticism

148 pages, Paperback

First published February 20, 2006

About the author

Thomas Howard (b. 1935) is a highly acclaimed writer and scholar.

He was raised in a prominent Evangelical home (his sister is well-known author and former missionary Elisabeth Elliot), became Episcopalian in his mid-twenties, then entered the Catholic Church in 1985, at the age of fifty. At the time, his conversion shocked many in evangelical circles, and was the subject of a feature article in the leading evangelical periodical Christianity Today.

Dave Armstrong writes of Howard: "He cites the influence of great Catholic writers such as Newman, Knox, Chesterton, Guardini, Ratzinger, Karl Adam, Louis Bouyer, and St. Augustine on his final decision. Howard's always stylistically-excellent prose is especially noteworthy for its emphasis on the sacramental, incarnational and ‘transcendent’ aspects of Christianity."

Like C.S. Lewis, who he greatly admires and has written about often, Howard is an English professor (recently retired, after nearly forty years of teaching), who taught at Gordon College and then at St. John's Seminary. He is a highly acclaimed writer and scholar, noted for his studies of Inklings C.S. Lewis Narnia Beyond: A Guide to the Fiction of C.S. Lewis (2006, 1987) and Charles Williams The Novels of Charles Williams (1991), as well as books including Christ the Tiger (1967), Chance or the Dance (1969), Hallowed be This House (1976), Evangelical is Not Enough (1984), If Your Mind Wanders at Mass (1995), On Being Catholic (1997), and The Secret of New York Revealed.

Reviews

[Cindy Rollins · Rating 5 out of 5]

Thomas Howard has written an entirely accessible guide to understanding the entirely unaccessible but highly delightful, Four Quartets by T.S. Eliot. You can find a video of Howard discussing the premise of this book here: https://youtu.be/fnTqmpti6So. It is a winsome video which offers a new voice in which to read this volume. If you are going to read Eliot then you are going to want to read this too.

[Vanessa Johnson · Rating 5 out of 5]

I had to get this book after listening to Thomas Howard's wonderful lecture on Four Quartets. What a gem! After reading the book, I was delighted to learn his sister is Elisabeth Elliot! May he be eternally rewarded for the great service he has done in illuminating this difficult poem!

[Chelsea Lane · Rating 5 out of 5]

I highly recommend as an accompaniment to Eliot’s Four Quartets. This is my second Thomas Howard book this year and I really enjoy his insight and style of writing—he’s starting to feel like a friend.

Editing to add: I just learned that Thomas Howard is Elisabeth Elliot’s brother and my mind is blown.

[Miss Clark · Rating 4 out of 5]

"What we call the beginning is often the end. And to make an end is to make a beginning. The end is where we start from." ~ T. S. Eliot

The only thing better than reading Eliot's Four Quartets is reading Thomas Howard's thoughts and ruminations on them, both scholarly and entirely unacademic. He takes you with him on his journey through the poems, but he never claims to be the authority on them or to be able to tell you what it was that Eliot is saying or what you ought to be taking away from them as so many "professional" texts do. Still, the background information that he provides does help illuminate the texts, especially for anyone unfamiliar with either Eliot or his times.

Most highly recommended.

Love "is itself unmoving." It is only "the cause and end of movement, Timeless, and undesiring..."
Passion, romantic love, infatuation, fraternal or paternal or maternal or filial love, patriotism, attachment to an old family house: these are all loves. Love itself is the object of all desire, but it is not itself desire.

Emphasis my own.

"humankind cannot bear very much reality." We could not sustain the sudden epiphany of Reality. The best we can hope for are those fugitive hints, which adumbrate Reality. The image of that fleeting state of consciousness that stands on the cusp of time and Reality.

[Mat · Rating 4 out of 5]

I take my hat off to Professor Thomas Howard.
While this is not an exhaustive line-by-line explanation of Eliot's final masterpiece, Four Quartets, what we have here instead is a running commentary with an introduction and chapters on each of the four individual poems - Burnt Norton, East Coker, The Dry Salvages and Little Gidding.

I wish to say that I disagree with some of the other criticisms of this book - this is not pedantic or pompous at all. In fact, I really liked Howard's style of writing. It is academic but not overbearingly so and he uses just the right amount of humour here and there to relax the reader and make this a very enjoyable experience. Sometimes, he jokingly pretends as if he is talking to Eliot himself.

You come away from this book feeling three things: 1) Thomas Howard had a great respect for Eliot as a poet and possibly as a Christian (although Howard keeps his own religious views under wraps - wisely so); 2) Thomas Howard believes that Four Quartets is an absolute masterpiece of poetry and deserves to be read, discussed and analyzed etc.; 3) finally, you come away with a better understanding of what Eliot was trying to achieve in this work, all the complex themes, some of them intertwining from one part to the next and back again, the theme of time ... or should I say timelessness, or say again, that even time itself is an illusion? There is much Buddhist philosophy within the underlying structure of the poem.

But I won't spoil any more of it for you. Take the plunge yourself. Howard is a fun teacher, a sort of modern-day Virgil, guiding us through the more difficult currents of Eliot's beautiful final work, Four Quartets.

[Harris Silverman · Rating 1 out of 5]

Dove Descending: A Journey Into T.S. Eliot's Four Quartets

I was pretty surprised to learn that the author of this book has been teaching Eliot at the university level for many years, and that he studied Eliot in depth himself as a student. He doesn’t seem to have any real insights into, or even a basic understanding of, the poem; he seems unable to articulate his thoughts, if indeed he has any. The book rambles about, the tone is all over the place, and at times the author tries to be overly familiar. He doesn’t seem to have anything to say about the poem, and, based on what he says about the "theme" of the poem, I don’t think he knows what it’s about. (This is to some extent a general problem with Four Quartets; people with no feel for the spiritual element, for want of a better term, can’t be expected to understand the poem; but they don’t let that stop them commenting on it, because they don’t know that they don’t know.) I ended up putting the book down pretty quickly.

Furthermore, I’m not really clear on why the foreword was published. While it does have some funny bits, it mostly just displays a deep dislike of the poem and of Eliot. Its author seems to resent having had to write it, and he comes across as a bit of an asshole.

[David Anthony Sam · Rating 5 out of 5]

Thomas Howard apologizes regularly for the prosaism and reductiveness of his line-by-line reading of T. S. Eliot's Four Quartets. And he is correct that the poetry is much better and much more than his analysis. Yet great poets need great readers, as Whitman maintained. And it is wonderful as one reader to be in the room listening to another, deeply appreciate and erudite reader as he lives with one of the great poems of the last 100 years.

Howard clearly is of a mind with Eliot in terms of the religious assumptions and faith consistent with Anglo-Catholicism. That does not mean a reader of another faith, or no faith, cannot find power, meaning, and even solace in the poem or in Howard's exegesis of it.

I recommend Dove Descending, not as any sort of substitute for reading and rereading the Quartets themselves, but as a great resource in helping inform and reveal the poetry.

[Andrew Pitkin · Rating 4 out of 5]

Great book on the 'Four Quartets'. It points out many parts of the poem along Eliot's central theme(s) of Time, Past, Present, and Future. It shows how he illustrates this in all the parts of the poem. Luckily, Mr. Howard acknowledges the heresy of "theme" by saying that Eliot and all poets and writers would never think "theme" when writing. They simply write what it is they have to say.

But it's a quick, deft guide to the Quartets written for the layperson to understand Eliot's greatest work (in my humble opinion). It truly shows why the 'Quartets' deserve so much recognition amid Eliot's corpus. Read and be humbled and welcomed in to Howard's kitchen for some coffee while he goes through the 'Quartets' like your grandfather went over bricklaying with you when you visited when you were younger.

He's that welcoming.

[Luca · Rating 4 out of 5]

To "explain" the Four Quartets is almost an impossible task. There is the risk of being too literal and therefore boring and the one of being too personal and with that alienating the reader.
This book is a fine balance that tilts slightly to the "too personal".

The book is easy to read, and the author takes you by the hand, and helps you understand some of the passages, the references, the structures, the connections, and even some less-known words.
To anybody who is interested in T.S. Eliot, I suggest you read, re-read, listen, and re-listen the poem 50 times. Try to make your own understanding of it, and when you are done with that, only then I recommend you to read this helpful and well-written book.

PS: If you are unsure of this book, on YouTube you can find the author giving a lecture about the Four Quartets. In that way, you can see if it is something you like.

[Katelynn]

A noteworthy companion to the Four Quartets. I appreciated the author’s humility and openness about the difficult task of commenting on a work of poetry like this. There were some beautiful parts to the book as well.

“It is the office of poetry to show, not to tell.”

“… the poet’s job is never to hail us with new information. That is the job of textbooks, newspapers, and lectures. Poetry always submits to what is and, at best, succeeds only insofar as it vivifies that which is and opens our eyes yet again to what is already “there”.”

[Susan Wright · Rating 5 out of 5]

amazing in its own right

I have been pulled to The Four Quartets for a long time but always wondered if I wasn’t missing something. I knew that Eliot’s poetry was a felt experience and, as a student of Buddhism, I recognized very strongly the themes of interwoven time. But Thomas Howard’s book helped me complete my journey by overlaying the theme of redemption and suffering via the Catholic doctrines. Well, thank you thank you Mr. Howard and, of course, Mr. Eliot.

[Melinda · Rating 4 out of 5]

This took me a bit longer to read because I decided to read it side-by-side with the poems from T.S. Eliot's Four Quartets and then take my time on thinking and re-reading.

Very worthwhile, and very helpful! I read the chapter, read the appropriate portion of the poem, then re-read the chapter again. I wish I could have taken classes from Dr. Howard! He would have been a fabulous teacher!!

[NIGEL PEARCE · Rating 4 out of 5]

Dr. Thomas Howard breaks do a very seminal piece of work by T.S Eliot- Chapter by chapter verse by verse for the writing is so dense and we need a guide to walk us through the powerful piece of literature. When T.S. Eliot hear Beethoven he new he wanted to write something that capture the imagination of the hearer. The mystery is unraveled by this book!

[Fred · Rating 4 out of 5]

Mr Howard ultimately gets us to Eliot’s still point, but I’m sometimes in disagreement with his methods. In all fairness, the book is a worthy journey through the Quartets. But, is any book on these poems worthy of 5 stars? Eliot’s poetry is as personal as it is universal. Commentary on it will always be perfectly flawed. Mr Howard gives it a good run.

[Jalen · Rating 2 out of 5]

Maybe this isn’t a fair rating, but honestly, the poem is just so obtuse…Howard does his best here, but it just wasn’t very illuminating for me personally. There are some lovely passages and ideas in the poem, but I’m doubtful that any human being could really ever figure out what’s going on in this poem besides Eliot himself.

[Ryan Handermann · Rating 5 out of 5]

Have you read T. S. Eliot's Four Quartets? Or have you not read it? Then you need this book. Thomas Howard is an old literature professor, great commentator and he has his finger on Eliot's pulse. I couldn't read Eliot if I didn't have this book (and even then, I still need my wife to tell me what is going on in his poem).

[Deborah Schuff · Rating 4 out of 5]

The author has taught this poem many times in his classrooms, and it shows. This is an engaging, enlightening line by line discussion of The Four Quartets. It greatly helped me to better understand and appreciate this wonder poem.

[Mark Suriano · Rating 2 out of 5]

I've decided that I am just not a fan of T.S. Eliot. After seeing him quoted in a large number of spirituality resources, I found him uninspiring.

[susie hamilton · Rating 5 out of 5]

The only interpretation of the FQ that has ever made sense to me, opening the door to the poem in a brilliantly illuminating way.

[Richard · Rating 4 out of 5]

A good guidebook.

[Robert · Rating 4 out of 5]

Good insights, stylistically distracting (juvenile?).

[Jacob Vahle · Rating 5 out of 5]

PHENOMENAL and READABLE guide that was invaluable as I prepared to teach TS Eliot. Not too academic, but instead a huge help in getting through tricky sections of Eliot's poetry.

[Lauren · Rating 5 out of 5]

A must read to accompany the four quartets!

[Ellen · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is the most helpful and richly meaningful Eliot resource I have found so far. Beautiful insights on the Four Quartets. I highly recommend.

[Philip Zoutendam · Rating 3 out of 5]

Picked up as a companion to my first serious look at Eliot's Four Quartets. I wanted a critic whose thoughts would flow with - and not against - the current of Eliot's, so a Catholic writing for Ignatius Press, rather than Prof. Dryasdust writing for Ivory Tower Pres, seemed like a good choice. It certainly was not dry, and it was written from a point of both sympathy and reverence, which I appreciated. But though it was helpful in several places, and brilliant in a few, the author's voice and stylistic tropes were annoying and exhausting. He seemed a little too charmed with his own voice, and he wasted too much time and effort assuming the reader was everywhere flummoxed and scandalized by Eliot's poetry. Worth skimming for the good parts, but hard to sustain as a close read.

[Rick Davis · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book was enormously helpful in understanding Eliot's Four Quartets. I think Howard saw things in Eliot that Eliot himself did not see. And I saw things in Eliot that Howard did not see. And Howard saw many things in Eliot that I did not see. Isn't poetry grand?

[Paula · Rating 4 out of 5]

Thomas Howard's reading of Four Quartets was insightful. It broadened my understanding of Eliot's work in a way that I had never anticipated. I will be able to return to Eliot's poetry again with a trained eye, and a greater sense of appreciation. That is a lot to gain from so slender a text.

[Sharie]

I am in the process of reading this book. It is my first real stab at understanding poetry and I am enjoying it thus far.

[Douglas Wilson · Rating 3 out of 5]

Thomas Howard is a thoughtful guy, and he knows Eliot very well. His prose sometimes sparkles, and other times is a little too precious for me. But worth reading.

[Martin · Rating 5 out of 5]

Invaluable help in appreciating more fully Eliot and his "Four Quartets"