TS Elliot Question?

Question

I need to reference where this quote came from:
"I had far rather walk, as I do, in daily terror of eternity, than feel that this was only a children's game in which all the contestants would get equally worthless prizes in the end."
If you know where it can be found, please let me know!!
Thanks

Answer 1

I'm not sure where it came from, but I think it might have come from correspondence instead of a poem. Check "Eliot's Dark Angel: Intersections of Life and Art," page 129. The quote apparently comes from a letter he wrote to Paul Elmer Moore. You can do a Google Book search and read it online. I'm not sure if he is quoting himself from a poem he wrote or wrote the line originally in the letter.

Good luck!

Answer 2

It's a difficult passage to find; I've scanned through an edition of Eliot's "Collected Poems" with no luck and, as you've probably discovered, any web search of the phrase you found generates only references without citation. If you only need a textual reference for an essay or something, you can always use a secondary reference. There's a theological article linked below that would probably work.

Because many of Eliot's works are still copyright protected and therefore unavailable on the web, the actual citation may be tough to dig up. It's not in any of the biggies (Prufrock, The Waste Land, Four Quartets), in any case. Sorry.

Answer 3

I am curious as to this quote. By the time I look it up, someone will come up with the answer, I'm sure. I'm anxious to see the right answer. No doubt you will get some sarcasm... ignore them and let them wallow in their misery.

Answer 4

Haven't you learned how to research yet?

It helps if you spell the author's name correctly, and you have to learn to use something more than just Yahoo or Google.

Go here: http://www.knowledgerush.com/kr/servlet/Highlight?url=/paginated_txt/etext04/eelap10/eelap10_s1_p3_pages.html&query=daily+terror+eternity