The Family Reunion (Paperback)

~ T. S. Eliot (Author) "Not yet! I will ring for you..." (more)
Key Phrases: Lady Monchensey

Editorial Reviews

Product Description

A modern verse play dealing with the problem of man’s guilt and his need for expiation through his acceptance of responsibility for the sin of humanity. “What poets and playwrights have been fumbling at in their desire to put poetry into drama and drama into poetry has here been realized.... This is the finest verse play since the Elizabethans” (New York Times).

About the Author

Thomas Stearns Eliot, OM (September 26, 1888 – January 4, 1965), was a poet, dramatist, and literary critic. He received the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1948. Among his most famous writings are the poems The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock, The Waste Land, The Hollow Men, Ash Wednesday and Four Quartets; the plays Murder in the Cathedral and The Cocktail Party; and the essay "Tradition and the Individual Talent". Eliot was born in the United States, moved to the United Kingdom in 1914 (at age 25), and became a British subject in 1927 at the age of 39. Of his nationality and its role in his work, Eliot said: "[My poetry] wouldn’t be what it is if I’d been born in England, and it wouldn’t be what it is if I’d stayed in America. It’s a combination of things. But in its sources, in its emotional springs, it comes from America."

Product Details

• Paperback: 132 pages
• Publisher: Harvest Books (March 18, 1964)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0156301571
• ISBN-13: 978-0156301572
• Product Dimensions: 8.4 x 5.4 x 0.5 inches
• Shipping Weight: 5.6 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.3 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (3 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #1,026,058 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

7 of 7 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Brilliant writing, problematic drama, October 13, 2000

By	Carl Tait (New York, NY USA) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

T. S. Eliot's second play is loosely based on Aeschylus' "Eumenides," though set in modern times. The integration of classical elements is only partly successful: the Greek chorus of meddlesome relatives is oddly effective, but the several appearances of the Furies are forced and strange (as Eliot himself came to conclude). Furthermore, the play is awfully talky -- lots of setup without much payoff in dramatic action.

But what talk it is! "The Family Reunion" was written in the interregnum between the first and second of "Four Quartets," and the play develops and amplifies many of the same themes as the poems. We return to the "Alice in Wonderland" rose garden of "Burnt Norton" (the first Quartet) -- "I only looked through the little door / When the sun was shining on the rose-garden: / And heard in the distance tiny voices" -- while looking forward to key passages from later poems: "Or the distant waterfall in the forest, / Inaccessible, half-heard. / And I hear your voice as in the silence / Between two storms ...."

Though "The Family Reunion" may be justly criticized for its dramatic problems and weak conclusion, the writing is vintage Eliot and will prove both enjoyable and enlightening for devotees of his poetry.

6 of 6 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Excellent! A must-read for the fans and the critics alike., September 30, 1998

By A Customer

T. S. Eliot masters the craft of play-writing, and his verse adds to this powerful and imaginative tragedy. He manages to keep his many characters separate and portray every one of them with acute individuality. Reading this book leaves the reader without any doubts as to why Eliot was awarded the Nobel Prize.

4.0 out of 5 stars t.s. eliot's family reunion, March 12, 2009

By	Gerard Reed - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

Following WWII, Eliot published two plays, The Family Reunion and The Cocktail Party, both of which make for interesting reading and insightful commentary on contemporary culture, though they do not rival his earlier works in my judgment. In The Family Reunion, an aristocratic family gathers to welcome home Harry, Lord Monchensey, rather recently widowed when his wife was mysteriously lost at sea. Harry is expected to follow his mother's wishes and take over management of the family estate. Amy, a manipulative, domineering woman, had restructured heir plans (which had been earlier foiled when Harry married a woman Amy disliked) and hoped the family reunion would consummate them. Harry, however, refuses to fall into his mother's scheme. His experiences have quickened his thirst for something more than the comfort and ease of an aristocratic manor, with its lands and income. So he departs as abruptly as he arrived--to become a missionary! Exactly where he headed and what "missionary" activity he embraced we don't discover, but it's obvious Harry took a radical turn away from his mother's plan and followed an inner hunger in quest of something more real.
The Family Reunion describes the petty, vain world of comfortable people with little to live for. It also reveals an inner spiritual world where those who seek find, those who knock have doors opened for them.