March 11, 2002
Although the history of literary marriages is littered with tragic muses and sacrificial spouses, few partnerships are considered as ill-starred as that of T.S. Eliot and Vivienne Haigh-Wood (1888–1947). History has condemned the first wife of the great American ex-patriate modernist as a neurotic, hypochondriacal harridan whose presence tormented Eliot and whose committal to an insane asylum after 17 years of marriage proved a long-overdue relief for the beleaguered genius. (Virginia Woolf memorably characterized Vivienne Eliot as "this bag of ferrets" hanging around the poet's neck.) Seymour-Jones's biography, while often stressing Vivienne's victimhood, is a nuanced portrait of an independent spirit becoming unhinged. In their early years together, the Eliots were infamous for their constant peregrinations, their chronic yet evasive medical problems, their money troubles and persistent unhappiness. The lively banter and free sexual mores prized by their friends in the literary avant-garde did little to strengthen their marital stability. Glimpses of their oppressive, sexually silent marriage appear in The Waste Land, Sweeney Agonistes
and The Family Reunion–which masterpieces, Seymour-Jones (Beatrice Webb) argues, Eliot might never have written without his intolerable muse. She also endeavors to restore Vivienne's status as a close literary collaborator. As an intellectual biography of the Eliots, this volume should be of considerable interest to scholars of modernism. It stands as a chronicle of a fine mind—highly unstable but not necessarily insane. Illus. not seen by PW. Agent, Kim Witherspoon.(Apr.)Forecast:Though its length may intimidate some, this could break out beyond the hard-core poetry crowd to readers interested in women's lives, particularly in efforts to rehabilitate maligned muses (think
Zelda and Brenda Maddox's
Nora).