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To understand Eliot's weighty contribution to the pantheon of modernism, one must take account of his dramatic career. Where the Words Are Valid brings to modernist scholars' serious attention a large body of work that has often been glibly patronized and relegated to near-obscurity. Eliot's plays embody more significant connections than disruptions with the rest of his work, and are integrally related to the other elements of his oeuvre. Further, they contain a richly suggestive autobiographical vein that illuminates the persona and psyche of Eliot the playwright and, as well, throwbacks to Eliot as a younger poet and critic.
List of contents
Sweeney Agonistes: "I Gotta Use Words"
The Rock: "There Is No Life That Is Not in Community"
Murder in the Cathedral: "Our Eyes Are Compelled to Witness"
The Family Reunion: "The Particular Has No Language"
The Cocktail Party: "Where the Words Are Valid"
The Confidential Clerk: "Mind Control Is a Different Matter"
The Elder Statesman: "The Words Mean What They Say"
Bibliography
Index
About the author
Randy Malamud is Regents’ Professor of English at Georgia State University, USA. He is the author of 11 books, including the influential Reading Zoos: Representations of Animals and Captivity (NYU Press, 1998), The Importance of Elsewhere: The Globalist Humanist Tourist (Intellect, 2018), and Strange Bright Blooms: A History of Cut Flowers (Reaktion, 2021). He writes about film, travel, ecocriticism, and culture for the Chronicle of Higher Education, Times Higher Education, Film Quarterly, Senses of Cinema, Film International, Common Knowledge, Salon, Huffington Post, The Conversation, and truthout. He has been interviewed about his books on NPR, BBC, CNN, and numerous podcasts. He is a Fellow of the Oxford Centre for Animal Ethics.
RANDY MALAMUD is Assistant Professor of English at Georgia State University, where he teaches Modern Literature. He is the author of The Language of Modernism (1989) and T.S. Eliot's Drama: A Research and Production Sourcebook (Greenwood, 1992), as well as articles on Virginia Woolf, James Joyce, and other modern figures. He is currently working on an interdisciplinary study of modernism in literature and the other arts, as well as a cultural studies project about literary images of zoos.
