A Class for All Adults Who Love Great Literature/T.S. Eliot
11:30 AM -12:30 PM – Room 104

To read T. S. Eliot’s Four Quartets is to meditate on the great themes of God’s relationship to humans; the philosophy of time; the nature of redemption; and the nature of poetry itself. It is a poetic meditation that weaves motifs of other great thinkers and writers, such as Dante, Julian of Norwich, St. John of the Cross, the Bhagavad Gita and pre-Socratic philosophy. Those who engage in the study of this poem, Eliot’s magnum opus, rarely are left unchanged. To study it is itself a spiritual journey. We will take four weeks, one for each section of Four Quartets, to study and savor—and meditate with—this great poem.

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Feb  12

“Burnt Norton”

We will join together to learn a bit about Thomas Stearns Eliot and his poetry, and will focus on this first Quartet, entitled “Burnt Norton.”

Feb 19

“East Coker”

The second movement of the poem is a more personal examination of the notion of “time,” a main subject of the poem. East Coker is associated with Eliot’s ancestral home.

Feb 26

“The Dry Salvages”

The third section of the poem is named for a well-known ledge of rocks off the Massachusetts coast. How is human life “wrecked,” and in need of “salvation?”

Mar 04

“Little Gidding”

Set against the backdrop of a London air raid, it’s perhaps some of T. S. Eliots best and best known work – highly philosophical and concrete at the same time.
John Timpane, an editor at the Philadelphia Enquirer, is a published poet and author of Poetry for Dummies and a former professor of English at Rutgers University.
Nancy Allen received her doctorate in English Literature, with a focus on the poetry of Gerard Manley Hopkins. She is an administrator and teacher at Immaculata University.
Jeff Vamos, the pastor of The Presbyterian Church of Lawrenceville, is a fan of Dante, Eliot, and great literature.