TS Eliot was never young. That, at least, is the impression many readers get both from his work and from the biographies written about him. Yet, while though this appearance of early senescence may be quite understandable, it is not true. Thanks to the meticulous librarianship of his wife, Valerie, almost every letter and fragment of writing that portrayed Eliot in the best possible light has been preserved and I am very grateful to have been granted permission to read them.
Though my admiration for Eliot as a poet borders on devotion, I have been careful not to let that colour my assessment of him as a person. Thus, I do not propose to shy away from the difficult areas. Some have accused him of anti-semitism and I regret to say that I do find isolated instances of anti-semitism in his early work. And yet it is an anti-semitism very much of its day and as Eliot went on to make friends with a lot of Jews, I do not think we need to dwell too long on it.
TS could become really quite wild when he heard the cha-cha
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