Vendor
	Liepman Literary Agency Marc Koralnik
Original language
English

THE HYACINTH GIRL

Lyndall Gordon

T.S. Eliot's Hidden Muse

A ground-breaking work from the pre-eminent T.S. Eliot biographer, drawing on over a 1,000 newly revealed letters written by the poet

Among the greatest of poets, T.S. Eliot protected his privacy while publicly associated with three women: two wives and a churchgoing companion. Yet he concealed a longtime love for an obscure American: Emily Hale, a drama teacher to whom he wrote (and later suppressed) more than a thousand letters. Hale was the source of memory and desire' in The Waste Land.

Leading biographer Lyndall Gordon reveals a hidden Eliot through both sides of the recently unsealed Hale
correspondence also offering new insight into the other spirited women who shaped his life and art: Vivienne, the flamboyant wife with whom he shared a private wasteland; Mary Trevelyan, his companion in prayer; and Valerie Fletcher, the young disciple to whom he proposed when his second chance with Emily foundered. Though Eliot kept his women apart, they spurred his transformations as expatriate, convert, and, finally, a man made for love'.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Lyndall Gordon has won the Cheltenham Prize and the James Tait Black Prize, been longlisted for the Samuel Johnson Prize, and shortlisted for the Duff Cooper Prize and the Comisso Prize in Italy for her Emily Dickinson biography, LIVES LIKE LOADED GUNS.

Available products
Book Published 2022-10-01 by Virago

Comments

"Representing the largest single series of the poet's correspondence, in January 2020 the 1,131 letters TS Eliot wrote to Hale from 1930 to 1956, housed in 12 boxes at Princeton University Library for over 60 years, will have their steel security bands cut and be opened after decades' confinement. Whilst these letters will lead the project, his relationships with other women who were close to him - extending also to his first wife, Vivienne Haigh Wood, companion Mary Trevelyan, and second wife Valerie Fletcher, as well as his mother, and first publisher Virginia Woolf - will also be explored in the book. Acknowledging Gordon's 40 years experience of writing about Eliot, [Lyndall's publisher] Lennie Goodings commented: "This is the book Lyndall Gordon was born to write; it draws on all her intuitive understanding of this mysterious poet. We are thrilled."''"

TS Eliot's love letters revealed: 'He wrote ardently, and with great emotion' Read more...

Eliot began writing letters to Hale in 1930, more than 15 years after they had first met. In the first two letters, [Frances] Dickey said, he basically confesses his love for Emily Hale and tells her that she's the great love of his life, that he's been writing for her all of these years, and he even names the places in his poetry where he has paid tribute to her or honored her in some way. Read more...

Norton (2020)