T. S. ELIOT & the art of COLLABORATION
(Cambridge UP, 2004)

This book examines the crucial role that collaboration with other writers played in the development of T. S. Eliot's works from the earliest poetry and unpublished prose to the late plays. It demonstrates Eliot's dependence on collaboration in order to create, but also his struggle to accept the implications of the process. In case-studies of Eliot's collaborations, the study reveals for the first time the complexities of Eliot's theory and practice of collaboration. Examining a wide range of familiar and uncollected materials, it explores Eliot's social, psychological, textual encounters with collaborators such as Ezra Pound, John Hayward, Martin Browne, and Vivienne Eliot, among others. Finally, this study shows how Eliot's later work increasingly accommodates his audience as he attempted to apply his theories of collaboration more broadly to social, cultural, and political concerns.

REVIEWS

"...perhaps the most interesting critical study of Eliot in a decade.... T. S. Eliot and the Art of Collaboration represents a lively and important contribution to modernist studies."

--Ronald Bush, The Review of English Studies (57)

"Badenhausen's carefully argued study helps us rethink key aspects of Eliot's theory and practice."

" ...rich and rewarding....Badenhausen's sensitive, meticulously argued study does much to persuade us that in light of current world events Eliot's paradoxical ruminations on the function of art as a socially unifying force in times of great discord merit renewed critical attention."

--Elisabeth Daumer, English Literature in Transition, 1880-1920 (49.2)

"...a rich and complex consideration of Eliot's writing and writing habits, and of Eliot's relation to his work, his readers and tradition....a well-researched, thought-provoking and enjoyable exploration of a key aspect of creativity of a master writer."

--Shyamal Bagchee, Time Present: The Newsletter of the T. S. Eliot Society (no. 61)

"...a richly detailed and insightfully argued study that should change the terms of Eliot scholarship for some time to come."

--John Young, Textual Culture (1.2)

"There is much illuminating material in T. S. Eliot and the Art of Collaboration.... a work that provides an important account of Eliot and authorship."

--Year's Work in English Studies (2007)