Jeffrey Blevin’s “Absolutism, Relativism, Atomism: The ‘small theories’ of T.S. Eliot.”

摘要

This article traces T. S. Eliot’s intellectual development from F. H. Bradley’sabsolutism to Bertrand Russell’s atomism, and then to his own relativism. It alsoanalyzes the corresponding changes in Eliot’s poetry. Blevins offers ample evidence toshow not only Eliot’s general attitude towards “small theories”, but also probes into hisintricate relationship to them. One thorny issue about Eliot’s intellectual developmentis that he constantly changes his standpoint, sometimes to the degree of selfcontradiction,and in his early works he is often too sceptical to believe in onephilosophical system even when he uses it to attack another. Blevins notices thedynamic development of Eliot’s philosophical worldview, and in showing how Eliotcracks Bradley’s absolutism and Russell’s atomism he also notes the changes of Eliot’sattitude towards them, demonstrating Eliot’s efforts to amalgamate the two opposingtheories into his poetic sensibility. As Blevins notes, Eliot sees Bradley’s and Russell’sworks as not just philosophy, but also “as a style” (103).