“ Ash W ednesday” .
A Poem of Earthly and Heavenly Love
by Finn Vergmann
The study of literature in general, like other human activities, is subject to the
fluctuations of fashion so that some fields tend to be intensely cultivated for a
certain period, merely to fall into neglect a few decades later. So with the study
of individual poets. Detailed interpretation e.g. of the poetry of T. S. Eliot
abounds whereas many of the larger aspects of his verse have been almost entirely neglected. This almost myopic concentration on detail all too often leads
to a failure to interpret the very details correctly. It would seem that the time
is long overdue when more attention should be devoted to opening up the larger
vistas in Eliot’s poetry and the present article is an attem pt to analyze one or
two clusters of imagery which carry a special and I think it must be admitted,
very intense meaning in his poetry. The image ry in question has the added m erit
of summing up an im portant trend in the early poems and of pointing forward
to what follows after “Ash Wednesday” . At the same time a true understanding
of these symbols and their underlying meaning throws considerable light on
that, the most difficult of Eliot’s poems, “Ash Wednesday” .
To set a course which shall keep us from straying too far in the perilous
seas of Eliot’s symbolism we shall choose a certain passage from “Ash Wed­
nesday” which we hope to pro ve contains the key to the whole poem:
T he silent sister veiled in white and blue
Between the yews, behind the garden god,
W hose flute is breathless, bent her head and signed b u t spoke no w ord
But the fou n tain sprang up and the bird sang dow n
Redeem the tim e, redeem the dream
T he token o f the w ord unheard, unspoken
1. 141 seq.
To prove our point we shall have to go back to the early poems. A convenient
starting-point would be an examination of the em otional implications of the
word ‘hair’ which plays an im portant part in one of Eliot’s recurrent images.
“Ash W ednesday"
An indication o f the associations the word holds for the poet is furnished by
the epigraph of “Burbank with a Baedeker” . Here we find among other things:
“goats and monkeys, with such hair too!” . The linking of ‘hair’ with the
proverbially lecherous goats and monkeys from Othello 4,1 seems to suggest that
certain sexual connotations are inherent in the word for Eliot. The faet that
the phrase ‘with such hair too!’ is a borrowing from Browning rather seems to
emphasize the point since Eliot seized on just this for his own purpose. This
assumption is supported by the faet that in the early poetry there is a marked
tendency for ‘hair’ to appear in passages with erotic or even sexual overtones.
In “Mr. Eliot’s Sunday M orning Service” we find
A long the garden-w all the bees
W ith hairy bellies pass between
T he stam inate and pistillate,
Blest office o f the epicene.
Eliot has a way of summing up a character by means of one or two significant
details and characteristically he insists on ‘hair’ in his description of the epileptic woman in “Sweeney Erect” :
T his w ithered ro o t o f knots o f hair
Slitted below and gashed w ith eyes
This oval 0 cropped o u t w ith teeth:
‘H air’ in all these instances is characterized by a morally negative or at best
neutral quality and its use in these cases is in all probability occasioned by the
implications it has for Eliot, so that the sexual elements in these situations have
brought about its use. It is self-sufficient and used freely without being inte­
grated into any definite image whereas in other poems we have to do with a
definite and easily distinguishable image of which ‘hair’ is a necessary part. In
this image a different and more complicated mood prevails. It is the mood of
an essentially beautiful, but always frustrated experience, pictured as the sight
of a girl or woman. This experience remained in some obscure sense incomplete
and unfulfilled. It is most fully described in the “Figlia Che Piange” but with
characteristic economy it is used again in “The Waste Land” in the description
of the hyacinth girl. Here, as well as in “La Figlia” we notice the im portant
role played by the word ‘hair’ in the im age:
‘You gave me hyacinths first a year ago;
‘They called me the hyacinth girl.’
- Yet when we cam e back, late, from the H yacinth garden,
Y our arm s full, and y our hair wet, L could not
Speak, and my eyes failed, I was neither
Finn Vergmann
Living n or dead, and I knew nothing,
L ooking into the h eart o f light, the silence.
O ed’ und leer das Meer.
1.35 seq.
The hyacinth, here chosen for its suggestion o f fertility, reminds one of the
flowers carried by “La Figlia Che Piange” . In both passages ‘hair’ retains its
original association with something erotic. From what Eliot says about early
sexual experience and the deeper meaning that it may have in his essay on
Dante (cf. “Selected Essays” , third edition p.273) and from the intense use
made of this material it would appear that at the bottom of it all there is an
early experience of this type, though for our purpose - as indeed for all literary
purposes - it is futile to speculate on what exactly it may have been. It is evi­
dent, however, that it impressed itself strongly on his mind and acquired a profound significance. Those of our readers who are curious to follow up this clue
may be referred to “Dans le R estaurant” where it is likely that something like
the original experience is described, though here by the distinctly unpleasant
‘garQon délabré’. More interesting to us concerned less with psychology than
with the art of poetry, is the interpretation of our findings within the frame­
work of the poems. It is clear that this image expresses a sexual experience of
some kind which has an incomplete character in that it ends half-way and never
reaches fulfilment, hence its association in “ Figlia Che Piange” with parting
and in “The Waste Land” with frustration. On the other hand it retains certain
positive aspects, thus differing widely in its implications from the attitude towards sex evinced in the early poetry. Even the positive experience remains,
however, an essentially human one and so, as we shall see, it is rejected together
with earthly love in general in “Ash Wednesday” . It deserves to be noted that
the two group of images are verbally interconnected by the word ‘h air’.
As an unambiguous comment on Eliot’s attitude to hum an love may serve
an interesting phenomenon in the early poetry. In a fair number of cases beasts
of prey are evoked in connection with women. There are the juxtaposition of
Grishkin and the jaguar in “Whispers of Im m ortality” and these vigorous lines
from “Sweeney Among the Nightingales” :
Rachel née Rabinovitch
T ears at the grapes with m urderous paws;
Furtherm ore one may think of the French poem “ Lune de Miel” though here
we have to do, not with beasts of prey but more generally with animals. This
imagery, however, cannot fail to reveal Eliot’s disgust with what others would
regard as the more valuable features of hum an existence.
“A sh W ednesday”
M ais une n uit d ’été, les voici å R avenne,
A l’aise entre deux draps, chez deux centaines de punaises;
La sueur aestivale, et une forte odeur de chienne.
It must needs be said that this partieular aspect of his sexual imagery, though
characteristic of E liot’s mainly negative treatment of earthly love, is not carried
beyond the early poetry and is not found in “Ash Wednesday” . Here another
cluster of images developed in “The Waste Land” predominates. Two passages
from “The W aste Land” and “Ash Wednesday” respectively which show interdependence by their emotional content have a further link by the faet that both
are descriptions of pastoral scenes filled with sound and seen through a kind
of window. The first passage by referring to the legend of Philomele, with
which Eliot had shown a growing preoccupation, unambiguously takes on a
sexual meaning and gives a special tone to this part of the poem. We note in
passing the usual contrast between the ancient and the modern world.
A bove the antique m antel was displayed
T he change o f Philom el, by the b a rb aro u s king
So rudely fo rc e d ; yet there the nightingale
Filled all the desert with inviolable voice
A nd still she cried, and still the w orld pursues,
‘Jug Ju g ’ to dirty ears.
“ T he W aste L an d ” I. 97 seq.
These lines may profitably be compared with some from the third poem in
“Ash Wednesday” :
A t the first tu rn in g o f the third stair
W as a slotted w indow bellied like the fig’s fruit
A nd beyond the h a w thorn blossom and a pasture scene
T he broadbacked figure drest in blue and green
E nchanted the m aytim e with an antique flute.
Blown hair is sweet, brow n h a ir over the m outh blown,
Lilac and brow n h air;
“ A sh W ednesday” 1. 107 seq.
It is curious to notice that the word ‘antique’ occurs in both passages and it
may well be that for some reason the word has an obscurely erotic colouring
for Eliot since it reappears in another unpleasant passage, viz. towards the end
of “A Game of Chess” 1. 156, ‘You ought to be ashamed, I said, to look so
antique’. But more im portant is the mention of Priapus, who was used by
Eliot as early as in “Mr. Apollinax” . In antiquity, of course, Priapus was a
god of fertility who was often represented as a grotesquely deformed creature
with the phallic symbol, so there is no mistaking the allusion. We notice also
that the window is ‘bellied like the fig’s fruit’. The fig here has a special re­
Finn Vergmann
ference for as Lucas points our in the notes to his edition of Webster (vol. II,
p. 152) ‘in several European languages the fig is associated with an offensive
gesture as old, at least, as Rome itself ... with phallic implication ... perhaps
owing to the resemblance between the opening fig and the vulva’. We might
quote as an instance of the use of the fig in modern literature D. H.Lawrence’s
poem “Figs” :
T he Italians vulgarly say, it stands for the fem ale p art, the
fig-fruit:
T he fissure, the yoni,
T he w onderful m oist conductivity tow ards the centre.
D. H. Law rence, “ The C om plete Poem s” Vol. II, the Phoenix E d itio n , p. 8
Finally, there are ‘hair’ and ‘flowers’, i.e. a reference to our second group of
images.
This passage, then, is the point where two im portant currents in Eliot’s
early poetry converge, the void and repulsive sexual experience exemplified in
“Sweeney Among the Nightingales” and the strangely frustrated, but positive
experience found in “La Figlia” and “The Waste Land” , two currents which
are verbally interconnected by the word ‘h a ir’. The two groups here meet in
one passage in a way so that ‘the broadbacked figure’ in some sort becomes the
representative of hum an love, standing within the framework of the poem for
the attraction and tem ptations that this must needs imply for a Christian, just
as Priapus had within the poetry as a whole come to represent the repulsiveness
of love. The two currents that we have pointed our join at this stage whence
the final prayer
L ord, I am not w orthy
L ord, I am not w orthy
but speak the w ord only.
1.117 seq.
This passage in other words refiects the fundamental confiict with which “Ash
Wednesday” is concerned and which seems to be of a more private and personal
character than one would normally suppose. We shall return to this confiict
and our postulated key passage after a brief examination of the other main
group of symbols in “Ash Wednesday” .
Although the problems Eliot grapples with remain essentially the same
throughout, though with somewhat varying emphasis, we are faced with a
cleavage in style and technique after “The Waste Land” . At the same time a
tendency towards a new and different set of symbols makes itself felt and in a
parallel way old symbols take on a new lease of life by gathering up new asso­
ciations. The word ‘face’ may be quoted as an instance of how an old symbol
“A sh Wednesday"
acquires new value. In the early poetry it in variably denotes the emptiness of
modern people and civilization or their fear of contact which makes them prepare their faces as a defence against other people. So in “Prufrock” :
T here will be tim e, there will be tim e
T o p repare a face to m eet the faces th a t you m eet.
In the later poetry it has a religious significance and becomes a symbol of the
Lady in “Ash Wednesday” :
I rejoice th at things are as they are and
I renounce the blessed face
A nd renounce the voice.
1. 20 seq.
In “A sh Wednesday” we find that the poet is beginning to draw on a distinctly
Christian symbolism. Its centre is the ‘gården’. These symbols are so wellknown to any student of literature that only the briefest outline is necessary
(see Wilhelm M olsdorf, “Christliche Symbolik der mittelalterlichen K unst” ,
Lpz. 1926, p. 142). This medieval symbolism springs from a tradition originating
in the fourth chapter of the Canticles where we find expressions like ‘A garden
enclosed is my sister, my spouse, a spring shut up, a fountain sealed’ (4,12)
and ‘Thou art a fountain of gardens, a well of li ving waters, a stream from
Lebanon (4,15). When during the Middle Ages the Song of Songs was given
an allegorical interpretation medieval man saw symbols of the Blessed Virgin
in these verses. She was the ‘hortus conclusus’ and the ‘fons signatus’ because
She carried Him in Her womb. Round these symbols of Mary congregated many
others. She was spoken of as the Rose, the ‘fons hortorum ’ and the ‘well with
living waters’ (‘puteus aquarum viventium’) and interesting for the interpreta­
tion of “The Hollow M en” and “The Four Q uartets” as the ‘stella m aris’. Yery
often, also, the garden became the scene o f the hunting of the unicorn and it
may be more than a coincidence that a unicorn takes part in the procession
in the fourth poem of “Ash Wednesday” . T hat Eliot should draw on this reli­
gious source cannot come as a surprise especially as he uses material from the
Liturgy freely. The poet calls on Mary and we notice the various symbols:
L ady o f silences
C alm and distressed
T o rn and m ost whole
Rose o f m em ory
Rose o f forgetfulness
E xhausted and life-giving
W orried reposeful
The single Rose
Finn Vergmann
Is now the G arden
W here all loves end
T erm inate to rm e n t
O f love unsatisfied
O f love satisfied
End o f the endless
Journey to no end
C onclusion o f all th at
Is inconclusible
Speech w ithout w ord and
G race to the M other
F o r the G arden
W here all love ends.
1. 66 seq.
The water-symbolism connected with the fountain fits in well with the symbolism known from “The Waste Land” but even a superficial reading makes clear
th at the symbol has been narrowed down in in its field of application and its
multiple and extremely complicated meaning has been simplified. In “Ash
Wednesday” the Lady is seen as she
W ho then m ade strong the fountains and m ade fresh the springs
M ade cool the dry rock and m ade firm the sand
1. 126 seq.
Farther on towards the end all these symbols are summed up
Blessed sister, holy m other, spirit o f the fountain, spirit o f the
garden,
1. 209
We have now advanced far enough in our analysis to cope with the fundamental
thought of “Ash Wednesday” . To do this we shall again look at what we set
out to prove was the central passage of the poem.
T he silent sister veiled in white and blue
Between the yews, behind the garden god,
W hose flute is breathless, bent her head and signed but spoke no w ord
But the fountain sprang up and the bird sang down
R edeem the time, redeem the dream
T he token o f the w ord unheard, unspoken
Till the wind shake a th o u san d whispers from the yew
And after this o ur exile
1. 141 seq.
Here Priapus, the garden god as we have sen for long in Eliot the representative
of earthly love is confronted with heavenly love in the figure of the Lady. There
“A sh W ednesday”
is no real struggle for he is vanquished at onee. The living waters known from
the medieval tradition can begin to flow and the bird (we remember its associa­
tion with some positive religious experience in “M arina” ) can begin to sing.
The fundamental problem of salvation posed by the poem is solved for the time
being through divine intervention: grace has come to the struggling soul. A few
lines earlier (1. 123) we had learnt that the Lady was clad in white and blue.
White is the liturgical colour of faith whereas, as Eliot is a t pains to point out,
blue is M ary’s colour. M ary in the teaching of the Catholic church is the fore­
most representative of intercession and we are reminded of this role in the frequent quotations from various prayers, among them the Salve regina. Thus the
Lady represents grace without which salvation is impossible and which is the
only power that can do away with the attraction of the world. “Ash Wednes­
day” , then, is a poem about the struggle of faith and the illumination of the
moments of grace. Consequently the problem is viewed from two angles, on
the one hand the struggle of the will for renunciation in the first three and the
sixth poem while the fifth expresses doubt - probably not altogether orthodox if grace is at all possible and on the other hand the victory - if only temporary,
because the battle is for ever unending - granted by ‘the silent sister’ symbolizing grace. The positive moments when the struggle is blessed are given moving
expression in the fourth poem of the sequence. The poem moves like a wave
from the first part where too much stress is laid on the power of the will (‘be­
cause’), surging up towards the culminating moment of grace and back to the
last part with its realization of the failure of hum an will-power and its eainest
prayer for help in the never ending struggle (‘although’). Thus there is really
progress, something has been attained in the poem and a new position, different
from the initial one, has been reached.
“Ash Wednesday” takes up a central position in Eliot’s poetry. He had
talked about
yjie sjngje r OS6
Is now the G arden
W here all loves end
T erm inate torm ent
O f love unsatisfied
T he greater torm ent
O f love satisfied
1. 70 seq.
and this is the moment where earthly love gives way to heavenly love whence
the confrontation of the two figures. And it is with ‘the Garden Where all love
ends’, though perhaps in a somewhat wider sense that Eliot is concerned in his
later poetry.