Confidential Clerk: T.S. Eliot's Wise and Witty Modern Verse Play About Love and Longing

by T.S. Eliot

A modern verse play that touches on the sources of longing and the need to be loved. "Never has Eliot's apparently effortless prosody been more precise.... He has achieved complete mastery of words" (Kirkus Reviews). "It is a wise, witty, elegant play whose characters speak finely and shrewdly" (Chicago Sunday Tribune).

Genres: Plays, Drama, Fiction, Poetry, Classics, Literature, Theatre

160 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1950

About the author

Thomas Stearns Eliot was a poet, dramatist and literary critic. He received the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1948 "for his outstanding, pioneer contribution to present-day poetry." He wrote the poems The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock, The Waste Land, The Hollow Men, Ash Wednesday, and Four Quartets; the plays Murder in the Cathedral and The Cocktail Party; and the essay Tradition and the Individual Talent. Eliot was born an American, moved to the United Kingdom in 1914 (at the age of 25), and became a British subject in 1927 at the age of 39.

See also http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/T.S._Eliot

Reviews

[Emma · Rating 3 out of 5]

I had to read this book for one of my classes because the theme of my course is lost/abandoned children.
I really enjoyed the writing style and the story was pretty interesting. All the exaggerated aspects gave a fun twist to the play even though it was quite predictable. I really recommend it.

[Drew · Rating 4 out of 5]

With its misplaced babies and mistaken identities, "The Confidential Clerk" feels like T. S. Eliot's response to Oscar Wilde's "The Importance of Being Earnest" and while it may not soar to the same uproarious heights it does go quite a bit deeper, even with its absurdities. For while the play ends in a marriage, a job, and a few reunions and reveals, no one -- not the smug financier, not his ditzy wife, not the disillusioned organist who may or may not be the son of one of them -- comes away quite happy. "Wishes, when realized, sometimes turn against those who have made them."

[J. Alfred · Rating 3 out of 5]

Reminds me of Shakespeare's late stuff: more gentle, more hopeful, aiming for a kind of benign mystery. Good strong sedate work from maybe the twentieth century's greatest poet.

"I dare say truly religious people --
I've never known any-- can find some unity.
Then there are also the men of genius.
There are others, it seems to me, who have at best to live
In two worlds-- each a kind of make believe.
That's you and me."

[Illiterate · Rating 5 out of 5]

Eliot’s farce of mistaken identities is also a morality play. Peace (salvation) comes from understanding - overcoming alienation from self and others (God).

[Camille · Rating 4 out of 5]

I finished this book in two hours, I flew through it! It was just great, like everything T.S Eliot wrote, it seems. I see quite a pattern here, and I can't wait to read the rest of his plays.
He talks about family and passion in this incredible play, and he discusses the matters in such way that one can be absolutely sure that Eliot was a very passionate man, indeed. Colby is such an interesting character, he seemed different from the rest of them as they basically fought over him. He was clever and observant and wise and knew what he wanted. Lady Elizabeth was a silly woman but her character amused me with her oddiness. Eggerson was kind-hearted and always saw the best in people like Colby said. Everyone trusted in him, especially Claude who kept trying to connect with his children and find connections with them. I liked him, too though it made me feel a bit bad how he had resigned to his pottery dream and thought it was something to be mocked by. The conversation he had with Colby during the first act was one of my favorites; their dicussion over passion was real, and raw and it hurt but it was so good it just made you want to keep going. Another amazing conversation was the one between Colby and Lucasta. The way they wanted to understand each other and the garden analogy---it was realistic and pure at the same time. The connection they had was the one everyone wants, isn't it? And the sudden change in her demeanor surprised me, I hadn't thought that her first impression was fake. It hurt that they didn't end up together, for I think they would've had a great relationship, but their connection was cut short by the misunderstanding and I think that's the saddest part; that even at the end, they couldn't understand each other. Kaghan was amusing, too, a bit of a fresh air amidst the house. It was funny and unexpected to find he was the son Elizabeth was looking for. Ironic, too, for they both disliked each other a whole lot. But the ending was great, too! I was glad to find Colby didn't give up on his dream, that he chose to follow it even if it meant he wouldn't be the best at it. It hurt to see the connection between him and Claude break at the end but it was understandable.

To conclude, this play was great and I highly recommend it!

[Jim Brennan · Rating 3 out of 5]

I don't know about reviewing it - but I saw the original production on tour in, I think, 1954 (the year of first publication, according to the slightly revised Faber paperback first edition of 1957, which i have just found in an Oxfam shop, showing signs of some reading at least) or (more likely) 1955 in Manchester, with at least one original star lead, Margaret Leighton, for whom Eliot had contrived a full-spotlight first entrance, of which she took full advantage, still in the cast.

Eliot had by then publicly acknowledged its source in the Ion of Euripides. In a way it's an essay in the West End theatrical conventions of its time into which he consciously but - High Tory that he was, without any declared subversive intent - sought to inject the the strengths of the classical theatre, while increasingly working within what he conceived to be the range of audience expectation. The producer of the first run, E Martin Browne, seems to have been his eager supporter in this view. Curiously, 'The Confidential Clerk' set out on its provincial tour in the wake of 'Waiting for Godot', which imposed its own conventions, as did the surge of English theatre of the fifties and sixties which followed it. 'The Family Reunion', which when new must have impressed West End folk as high-falutin, ironically may have been a better start in the long run, and not the false one Eliot seems to have thought it.

Looking at 'The Confidential Clerk' now, discounting its surface theatricality, and trying to see it as a study in self-deception, Eliot's solution, fundamentally that folk should be true to their own instincts about their identities and hold their ambitions up to the light before acting on them, seems a trifle simplistic - and if you were a sixth-former when the play was first performed in 1953 emphatically so. But it might just have more interest than we might think. Even its homages to West End convention are pasted on to another 'family reunion', which however schematically if closes the play, ends with very conventional, actorish, questions about something which is far from conventional. Possum had not retired.

[jeff cecelia · Rating 2 out of 5]

actually bad. ts eliot is usually cool as hell. this sucked.

[Preetam Chatterjee · Rating 4 out of 5]

This tome is again a negative and disheartening one. We get the sensation that Eliot has endeavored to make his characters of flesh and blood, and yet has botched to make us recognize ourselves with these characters who remain outlandishly remote. This is a play about the hunt for vocation in addition to a father. Sir Henry is the well-organized financier who wanted to be a bad potter. Lady Elizabeth is the dilettante in religion who wanted to be an inspirer of the artist. Colby is the bad organist who virtually became a financier, following the erroneous father to the incorrect vocation. The concluding footprints of Eliot’s poetry disappear in this tome. But this play does not have an impressive theme. It does not deal with matters relating to life and death, but simply without choice of what we want to do in the world. Sir Claude Mulhammer wanted to be a potter. He became a first rate potter in the city. Colby is his son. He appoints him as his 'confidential clerk', but the young boy is not satisfied with the job of being a clerk. He decides in favour of being a church organist. His choice for the job is that of a musician. He makes a safe choice for his happiness. He is not like Celia of ‘The Cocktail Party’ who prefers crucifixion to a content life. The dramatist congratulates Colby for his realistic, though conservative decision to be an organist, a second rate musician. The play exemplifies the truth of the remark. "If you haven't the strength to impose your own terms upon life, you must accept the terms it offers you." By the end the reader realizes that there is a serious substance behind the farce concealment of this play.

[El Bibliófilo · Rating 4 out of 5]

Comentarios en video: https://youtu.be/AuQSLKpxqgo

Conocer al otro y a sí mismo.
Una obra de teatro del ganador del premio nobel de literatura que ofrece una comedia que invita a la reflexión sobre la moral y sobre lo que conocemos de los otros. Las evocaciones que me generó están relacionadas con los niños (recuerdo la lectura de Silas Marner de George Eliot), e incluso la canción de salsa "Maria Teresa y Danilo". La profundidad de los caracteres invita a pensar en conocer a los otros, a nosotros mismos, y aún conociéndonos muy bien, plantea los dilemas sobre lo que debemos pedir o exigir a los otros o a nuestros hijos.
Sin duda una obra que entretiene e invita a reflexionar.

[Andrea · Rating 4 out of 5]

This was such a good balance of irony and depth. I was not expecting this play to be at once so light-hearted and so bitter.

It is all about what it means (and if it is possible at all) to know oneself and to know another, and about coming to terms with the fact that the other is not meant to fulfill one’s expectations and desires.

The play as a whole feels like the moment you realise you are staring to heal from a great pain. Sorrowful joy.

[Josh Bauder · Rating 3 out of 5]

Where Eliot supersedes his contemporaries is in the surprisingly profound conversations of his characters, even in a comedy. As for the plot: everybody gets what they wish for, if not what they really want.

[Tiffany K · Rating 2 out of 5]

Unlike "The Cocktail Party" -- his superior drawing room comedy that gracefully builds in absurdity -- this play begins and ends in the same boring mess.

[Hossein Gharibi · Rating 2 out of 5]

. ترجمه خانم بوذری متأسفانه پر از ساختارهای انگلیسی، ترجمه‌های تحت‌الفظی و جملات نامفهوم بود
از نمایشنامه زیاد خوشم نیومد، امیدوارم به خاطر نخوندن متن اصلی بوده باشه

[yengyeng · Rating 3 out of 5]

Hilarious one-liners.

[Zehra]

Okuduğum ilk İngilizce kitap.

[Joyce · Rating 3 out of 5]

eliot really 'fell off' as the kids say, there is very little density to the language here

[Philip Athans · Rating 5 out of 5]

Wow, did I connect with this play--a book bought and chosen to read entirely at random.

All the stuff about the psychic damage of giving up on your art, the family stuff…

Bananas.

[Cameron Delgado · Rating 3 out of 5]

Mrs. Guzzard was really moving like she was hosting an episode of Maury in the final act 💀💀

[Matthew · Rating 3 out of 5]

3.4

[Hannah Edberg · Rating 5 out of 5]

Är handlingen bra? Nej. Är karaktärerna tredimentionella? Nej. Är slutet bra? Nej. Är budskapet förmedlat bra? Nej. Kan vara den bästa boken jag läst på länge.

[David Sheward · Rating 3 out of 5]

(Borrowed from Lincoln Center Library) TS Eliot's articulate, bizarre attempt at a drawing room comedy. Nobody knows who is whose long-lost illegitimate son or daughter or what occupation they should follow.

[sabisteb aka callisto · Rating 5 out of 5]

Sprecher
Sir Claude Mulhammer – Kurt Horwitz
Eggerson – Richard Münch
Colby Simpkins – Günter König
Kaghan – Klaus Jürgen Wussow
Lucasta Angel – Lola Müthel
Lady Elizabeth Mulhammar – Elisabeth Flickenschild
Mrs. Guzzard – Lina Carstens

Regie: Ulrich Lauterbach
(hr 1954) 78 Min.

Wie anders sind doch die Hörspiele aus den 50ern als das Reißerische Zeug, das heutzutage auf dem Markt ist, und welches ich mir zuhauf reinziehe. Vielleicht liegt es auch daran, dass dieses Hörspiel auf dem Theaterstück eines Nobelpreisträgers basiert.
Die Inszenierung ist sehr minimalistisch, nur sehr wenige Hintergrundgeräusche, wenn überhaupt und hauptsächlich Dialogbasiert. Was es besonders macht ist, wieviel diese Dialoge transportieren, nicht nur die äußerst komplizierte Handlung, sondern auch philosophische Weltanschauung. Einige richtige Erholung nach den nieveaulosen Zeug, was ich mir die letzten Tage so reingezogen habe.
Sir Claude Mulhammer engagiert einen jungen Mann als seinen Privatsekretär, von dem er glaubt, es wäre sein unehelicher Sohn, welcher von Pflegeeltern aufgezogen wurde. Seine Frau, Lady Elizabeth Mulhammar, sieht in Colby Simpkins jedoch ihren verschollenen unehelichen Sohn, welchen sie vor ihrer Ehe bekam. Mrs. Guzzard, Colbys Tante soll Licht ins Dunkel bringen und bringt mit ihrem Geständnis so einige sichergeglaubten Familienverhältnisse ins wanken.
Überraschungsreich mit intelligenten, unerwarteten Wendungen, ein absoluter Genuss! Leider ist dieses Görspiel nicht auf CD erhältlich. Es lief am26. Oktober 2008 um 22:00 Uhr auf HR 2.

[Sanjuro · Rating 2 out of 5]

Really, the first play, or first work of any kind from TS Eliot, that I haven't loved. The play is drawn on too many coincidences to make it believable, or interesting. The characters are a bit bland, and the material too far from inspiring any sort of reflection.

There is one exception to this - the play has a lot to say about untapped potential, and the beauty of following in the path of happiness rather than success. This spoke to me, for a few pages in the middle and end of the play. But overall, the significance of the play was lost on me.

[Ella · Rating 4 out of 5]

The characters and T. S. Eliot's style held me enough so that I finished it in a night. The ending was a little absurd to me, but, as I read it, I was definitely caught making little chuckles by the people around me.

[Ash Crowe · Rating 3 out of 5]

An Eliot comedy only Eliot isn't a particularly funny writer. I found a first edition US, though, and that alone makes it worth reading - for me at least.

[Steve · Rating 4 out of 5]

Thought I'd reread/re-evaluate Eliot's plays. This one is delightful-- Noel Coward meets Euripides by way of Oscar Wilde. Who said ol' Tom lacked a sense of humor?

[T.]

Read aloud with a grand gang.

[G · Rating 5 out of 5]

Play of overlapping coincidences - leading to discovering identities and possible true selves. Interesting dialogues.