• We do not know very much of the future
Except that from generation to generation
The same things happen again and again.
Men learn little from others’ experience.
The same time returns. Sever
The cord, shed the scale. Only
The fool, fixed in his folly, may think
He can turn the wheel on which he turns.”
Except that from generation to generation
The same things happen again and again.
Men learn little from others’ experience.
The same time returns. Sever
The cord, shed the scale. Only
The fool, fixed in his folly, may think
He can turn the wheel on which he turns.”
• Thomas Becket, Part I
Murder in the Cathedral is a verse drama by T.S. Eliot, first performed in 1935, that portrays the
assassination of Archbishop Thomas Becket in Canterbury Cathedral in 1170. Eliot drew heavily on
the writing of Edward
Grim, a clerk who was an eyewitness to the event.
The play, dealing with an individual's opposition
to authority, was written at the time of rising fascism in Central Europe.
The action occurs between 2 and 29 December
1170, chronicling the days leading up to the martyrdom of Thomas Becket
following his absence of seven years in France. Becket's internal struggle is
the main focus of the play.
The book is divided into two parts. Part one
takes place in the Archbishop Thomas Becket's hall on 2 December 1170. The play
begins with a Chorus singing, foreshadowing the coming violence.
The Chorus is a key part of
the drama, with its voice changing and developing during the play, offering
comments about the action and providing a link between the audience and the
characters and action, as in Greek drama. Three priests are present, and they
reflect on the absence of Becket and the rise of temporal power.
The Interlude of the play is
a sermon given by Becket on Christmas morning 1170. It is about the strange
contradiction that Christmas is a day both of mourning and rejoicing.
Part II of the play takes
place in the Archbishop's Hall and in the Cathedral, 29 December 1170. Four
knights arrive with "Urgent business" from the king. These knights
had heard the king speak of his frustration with Becket, and had interpreted
this as an order to kill Becket. At the close of the play, the knights step up,
address the audience, and defend their actions. The murder was all right and
for the best: it was in the right spirit, sober, and justified so that the
church's power would not undermine stability and state power.
One of the most explicit
philosophies Eliot explores is what constitutes a true Christian martyr. As
Thomas explains in his Interlude sermon, a martyr is not merely one who dies
for God, but rather one who allows himself to be "the instrument of
God" (199). He argues that a martyr is not made by accident, but rather by
God's will. Thomas's journey in Part I is marked by his acceptance that he
wants to seek martyrdom for the sake of his pride and worldly glory, and his
subsequent willingness to rid himself of those desires and to die solely for
God's cause.
• Murder in the Cathedral explores how
people should navigate between these two powers, through Becket’s interactions
with:
• The Four Tempters
• The Four
Knights, and
• In Becket’s own
evolving understanding of his Martyrdom—his willingness to die for God.
• The first tempter treats spirituality as a kind of
decoration on worldly power—as something that can inspire joy and merriment by
bringing happiness to the state and, in the process, fix Becket’s conflicted
relationship with the king.
• The second tempter, however, sees spiritual power as
utterly ineffectual, and argues that to truly effect change Becket should focus
less on religion and return to his former political role as Chancellor.
• The third tempter sees spiritual power as basically
just another form of worldly power—or something that can be put to work to
achieve worldly ends that have no spiritual grounding. He argues that Becket
should use his role as Archbishop to help empower the lower class of country
lords to overthrow the king.
• The fourth tempter has the opposite opinion of the
second: he argues that Becket should devote himself solely to the realm of
spiritual power, and shirk the temporal, through martyrdom. Thus, the four
tempters all argue for certain ways of how the two forms of power should be
thought together or apart.
• The knights’ conception of the relationship between
worldly and temporal power leads them to call Becket a traitor: they think he’s
betrayed the worldly authority of the English crown through an overzealous
loyalty to the spiritual authority of the Pope (who has condemned the king).
• The knights therefore see worldly and temporal power as
separate entities that exist in a kind of natural opposition, an opposition
where both powers to some extent restrict one another.
The conflict between faith and state
for Archbishop Thomas Becket, religious adviser to King Henry II of
England, is central to Murder in the Cathedral. Like Christ in the New
Testament, Thomas confronts three temptations in his return, and must battle
the seduction each offers. A fourth temptation—martyrdom—appears as a new
enticement, pulling the Archbishop in with an alarming persuasion. Thomas
admits he’s considered martyrdom, though finds it best to accept God’s will as
the penultimate judgment. Eventually, Thomas is murdered by four knights,
at apparent behest of the king, and the play turns into their trial. A
lingering reminder remains, though: had the Archbishop not used religious power
to undermine the State, his death would not have been necessary.
Summing up
• King and Pope never appear on the stage, their forces
clash throughout the play
• Murder in the Cathedral shows the struggle of one man’s obligation to religion
and defying the many temptations of a political leader.
• The whole play has an economy of scenes and action. It
has the effect of unity of action on a single theme of how martyrdom takes
place.
• Play ends in tragedy with the murder of Becket, thus
portraying how protagonist is overcome by antagonist.
• Conflict with(in) and with(out) shows how the play is not
only outwardly performed but inwardly too.
Notes prepared from reading of the text and Internet Sites.
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