Anglo-Catholic in Religion: T.S. Eliot and Christianity

by Barry Spurr

Barry Spurr's eagerly-awaited, definitive study of T.S. Eliot's Anglo-Catholic belief and practice shows how the poet's religion shaped his life and work for almost forty years, until his death in 1965. The author examines Eliot's formal adoption of Anglo-Catholicism, in 1927, as the culmination of his intellectual, cultural, artistic, spiritual and personal development to that point. This book presents the first detailed analysis of the unique influence that Anglo-Catholicism's doctrinal and devotional principles, and its social teaching, had on Eliot's poetry, plays, prose and personal life. An informed presentation and discussion of Anglo-Catholicism at the time of Eliot's conversion and through the subsequent decades of his Christian faith and practice. Significant new material from correspondence and diaries which sheds light on Eliot's thought, poetry and prose. This book is essential reading for all scholars and readers of T.S. Eliot and his circle; for students and devotees of Anglo-Catholicism, and scholars of the interaction between literature and theology, especially in the twentieth century. It will also be of use to senior and Honours-level undergraduates and postgraduate research students working in the fields of Modernism and its principles and belief systems, and for students of religion, especially Western Christianity and Anglicanism.

340 pages, Paperback

First published December 1, 2009

Reviews

[Heath · Rating 4 out of 5]

A useful summary of the general tenets and practices of Anglo-Catholicism in England in the first half of the century. Chapter 5 is full of details about Eliot’s personal religious practices. There are occasional odd asides to the author’s political beliefs, as well as failures in editing, but these can be easily ignored.

[Richard · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is a very good introduction to Eliot’s Anglo-Catholicism, but it is also a very good introduction to peak Anglo-Catholicism (20’s-50’s) itself.