The Text of T. S. Eliot's "Gerontion"
William H. Marshall
IN March, 1947, Professor Willard Thorp of Princeton
University delivered an address, "The Poetry of T. S.
Eliot," at the University of Virginia before a McGregor
Room Seminar. The sponsors proposed to reprint "Gerontion"
in the program, and at first chose the poem as found in
the 1936 Harcourt, Brace edition of the Collected Poems, 1909-1935. However, when
they consulted a few earlier editions in order to assure
themselves of the correctness of the text, they discovered
that variants existed, and therefore they amused
themselves by constructing an eclectic text for
the program. On a subsequent occasion
the late Peters Rushton showed this program-text to Mr.
Eliot, pointing out to him some of the variants which had
been noticed. Mr. Eliot was interested and marked a copy
of the program, altering two of the readings and
confirming others by checks.
[1] The results are of
some interest, demonstrating that no printed edition up to
the present has conformed in every detail with Eliot's
full intentions. The poem, therefore, offers a neat case
history indicating that the need for critical editing
according to principles of textual criticism is by no
means confined to literature of earlier periods.
"Gerontion" has appeared to date in seven collected editions
totalling sixteen impressions, as follows:
- A. Ara Vos Prec,
London, Ovid Press (1919)
- B. Poems, New York,
Knopf (1920)
- C. Poems, 1909-1925,
London, Faber and Gwyer (1925)
- a) second impression, Faber and Gwyer
(1926)
- b) third impression, Faber and Gwyer
(1928)
- c) fourth impression, Faber and Faber
(1930)
- D. Poems, New York,
Knopf (1927)
- E. Poems, 1909-1925,
London, Faber and Faber (1932)
- a) second impression, New York and Chicago,
Harcourt, Brace & Co. (1932)[2]
- F. Collected Poems,
1909-1935, London, Faber and Faber (1936), a
so-called "advance proof" impression for limited
circulation[3]
- a) second impression, Faber and Faber
(1936), the earliest impression of this edition
distributed to the trade: labelled "first edition"
by the publisher.
- b) third impression, Faber and Faber
(1936)
- G. Collected Poems,
1909-1935, New York, Harcourt, Brace &
Co. (1936)
- a) second impression, Harcourt, Brace
(1936)
- b) third impression, Harcourt, Brace
(1945)
- c) fourth impression, Harcourt, Brace
(1948)
The following chart details the variants which have appeared
in these seven edition-texts, some through author's
corrections or revisions but some through printers'
errors. The final column provides the readings in the
McGregor program-text which Eliot either passed by without
comment or which he checked or altered. A preceding
asterisk indicates readings which
he
confirmed by checks; a double asterisk indicates Eliot's
alteration of the text to the form given.
A |
B. |
C. |
D. |
hd. were, |
were
|
were
|
were
|
1 month |
month, |
month, |
month, |
7 house |
house, |
house, |
house, |
8 window sill |
window sill |
window sill |
window-sill |
9 of Antwerp |
of . . . |
of . . . |
at . . . |
17 sign." |
sign": |
sign"! |
sign": |
26 Hakagama |
Hakagawa |
Hakagawa |
Hakagawa |
28 Fraülein |
Fraulein |
Fräulein |
Fräulein |
35 issues; |
issues, |
issues, |
issues, |
37 distracted, |
distracted |
distracted |
distracted |
42 hands |
hands, |
hands, |
hands, |
53 devils. |
devils. |
devils. |
devils. |
57 want |
need |
need |
need |
60 passion. . . it |
. . . it |
. . . it |
. . . it |
62 profit |
profit |
profit, |
profit, |
67 Mrs Cammell |
Mrs. Cammel |
Mrs. Cammel |
Mrs. Cammel |
70 by the Horn |
on . . . |
on . . . |
on . . . |
71 gulf claims |
Gulf claims, |
Gulf claims, |
Gulf claims, |
72 man, |
man |
man |
man |
72 on the Trades |
by . . . |
by . . . |
by . . . |
73 a sleepy |
a a sleepy |
a sleepy |
a . . . |
E. |
F. |
G. |
Eliot-program |
were
|
were
|
were
|
were, |
month, |
month, |
month, |
month |
house, |
house, |
house, |
house, |
window sill |
window sill |
window sill |
window sill |
of . . . |
of . . . |
of . . . |
of . . . |
sign!' |
sign!' |
sign!" |
sign!" |
Hakagawa |
Hakagawa |
Hakagawa |
Hakagawa |
Fraülein |
Fraülein |
Fraülein |
Fraülein[4]
|
issues, |
issues, |
issues, |
* issues; |
distracted |
distracted |
distracted |
* distracted, |
hands, |
hands, |
hands, |
hands, |
devils. |
devils. |
devils |
devils. |
need |
need |
need |
* need |
. . . it |
. . . them |
. . . them |
** . . . them[5]
|
profit |
profit |
profit |
profit |
Mrs. Cammel |
Mrs. Cammel |
Mrs. Cammel |
Mrs. Cammel |
on . . . |
on . . . |
on . . . |
* on . . . |
Gulf claims, |
Gulf claims, |
Gulf claims, |
Gulf claims, |
man |
man |
man |
** man[6]
|
by . . . |
by . . . |
by . . . |
* by . . . |
a . . . |
a . . . |
a . . . |
a . . . |
The textual history of these editions is made reasonably clear
by this collation. It is obvious that (B) Knopf's first
American edition was set from
an
author-revised copy of (A) on the evidence of lines 17,
26, 57, 67, 70, 71, and 72, all of which appear to contain
authoritative changes. The omission of the comma in the
heading and the umlaut in line 28, and the repetition in
73, are misprints.
[7] The case is less certain
for the variants in lines 1 and 42, since it is possible
that Eliot inadvertently passed over these in the program,
although his silence may have represented approval of the
altered form.
An interesting change made in the third edition (C) concerns
the exclamation point in line 17. The wrong position in
which this is printed suggests an authoritative attempt at
revision made in proof or in a copy of (B), in which the
substitution of the exclamation for the colon was marked
marginally but the necessary change in position was not
made clear to the printer. The variant in lines 28 and 73
corrects a misprint, but that in line 62 is an error. The
fourth edition (D), by Knopf in 1927, was obviously set
from (B), Knopf's 1920 text, on the evidence of the colon
in line 17. An Americanization creeps into line 8, and the
variant "at" in line 9 is a misprint. This edition,
therefore, has no authority. The fifth edition (E) by
Faber in 1932 used Faber's (C) of 1926 as printer's copy.
The substitution of single for double quotes and the
correct placement of the exclamation point in line 17
might have been made in proof, and appear to be
authoritative.[8] Otherwise there is no
change, except for the misprint in line 28 and the
correction of line 62. Faber's expanded collection of 1936
(F) was set from (E), with Eliot making the authoritative
alteration, either in copy or in proof, of "it" to "them"
in line 60. The misplaced umlaut in line 28 is a repeated
printer's error. As we should expect, Harcourt's expanded
edition (G) was set from (F) but with the umlaut
corrected. The one puzzling point is the reversion to
double quotes in line 17. The omission of the period in
line 53 is a misprint.
If we make the assumption, as is very plausible, that the
commas added in (B) in lines 1, 7, and 42 are
authoritative (despite the fact that Eliot silently passed
over the omitted comma in line 1 of the program), the only
crux remaining is the correct position of the exclamation
point in line 17. This is a quasi-substantive matter, for
the meaning is affected by the use of the exclamation as
referring to the quoted material itself or as Eliot's
comment on the quotation. However, it would be rather
perverse to argue that the position outside the quotes in
(C), when the point first appears, is the authoritative
one which was subsequently moved inside by printers' usage
and overlooked in successive proofs. The opposing argument
is very strong, that an actual error was caused in (C) by
a proof or copy annotation indicating the substitution but
neglecting to alter the position from that of the
deleted colon. Finally, it is
possible to conjecture that the punctuation changes in
lines 35 and 37 of (B) were in fact authoritative but
that, subsequently, Eliot came to prefer the original
pointing as found only in (A).
Notes