[탐색] 소크라테스와 화폐, 경제

출처 1: Barry Gordon. "Four Issues in Socratic Economic Analysis", Chapter 3 in Economic Analysis before Adam Smith. Palgrave Macmillan, London, 1975. 제한적 자료.

※ 발췌 (excerpt): pp. 42-43,

The philosophers did not leave a legacy which merely recommended a manner of approach to economic issues. Their concern with the origins of social lie and the maintenance of just relationships within in gave rise to a series of insights on particular problems in economics. Apart from those noted above in conncection with their conception of economics, these insights included influential analyses touching on the theories of money and interest, the question of communal versus private ownership of resources, and the theory of value. The contributions of Aristotle in these areas are of special significance for the future development of economic thought in Europe. It is quite impossible to chart the course of that development without appreciation of the positions he took and the ways in which those positions were interpreted. As one modern scholar has observed, 'Aristotle's influence on medieval city economy exerted through Thomas Acquinas was as great as later that of Adam Smith and David Ricardo on 19th century world economy.'[주]1

Opinion is divided sharply on whether or not Aristotle's widespread influence was something which economicsts should welcome in retrospect. For one writer, Aristotle is 'the first analytical economist', and it is he 'who laid the foundations of science and who first posed the economic problems with which all later thinkers have been concerned.'[주]2  For another, Aristotelian economic theory 'was to exert an influence both far-reaching and disastrous over historicans and theologians of succeeding centuries.' This second writer sees Aritotle's 'primitivism and ruralism' a dead weight which inhibited the thinkers of Rome and middle ages, such that tendencie to genuine economic analysis were thwarted. In particular Aristotle was an arch-enemy of economics, since he was equipped with 'a mind that never really understood what currency was' and turned his back on any 'prospect of indefinite increae of real wealth'.[주]3  That such a difference of opinion should exist is explained to a great extent by the combination of bold analytical initiative and sometimes puzzling failures encountered in the analyses considered in this chapter.

The nature and functions of money

In the ^Republic^, Plato recognize that the presence of a division of labour in society gives rise to the need for exchange of commodities amongst its citizens. The process of exchange will be facilitated by the introduction of 'a currency to serve as a token for purposes of exchange'. The end or purpose of money then is its action as a medium of exchange, and for this function a mere symbol or token can suffice.[주]4  The material of which money is composed is of little or no account.

Here, Plato is adoptin a theory of money which can be called 'non-metallist'. Money, to function effectively as money, need not consist of a material that has a value independent of its role as money. Community contract or state fiat establishes the status of something as the medium of exchange. There is no necesary 'commodity' dimension to that medium because of its substance. That Plato was consistent in his non-metallism is illustrated by a passage from the ^Laws^, his last written work. In this passage he advocates a type of policy that was anathema to orthodox monetary theorists of 18th- and 19th-century Europe. He proposes a divorce between international trading currency and the internal circulating medium of the city-state. The latter, he believes, should be devoid of intrinsic, ( ... ... )


출처 2: D.C. Schindler. "Why Socrates Didn't Charge: Plato and the Metaphysics of Money", Communio International Catholic Review, Fall 2009.

※ 발췌 (excerpt):

( ... ... ) There are two points to note here that in fact converge into one, which will be the primary point explored in the present essay. In the first place, Socrates' claim about his own motivation implies that there is a connection between sophistry and money-making. While this implication may not strike one as a great revelation, given that it is a regular and well-known theme in Plat's dialogues,[주]3  we intend to argue that the connection is more essential than typically realized, and that understanding the connection reveals something in turn about the nature of both sophistry and money. Secondly, and perhaps less obviously, Socrates' approach to the charges suggests an intriguing either-or: money ^would^ have been sufficient to explain his activity, so that its removal as a cause requires something else, in this case a reference to "the god at Dephi."  To put it over-simply, money and God appear as competitors for the role of the good that is adequate to explain human behavior. When St. Paul says that the love of money is the root of evil, it would seem that he is echoing a Platonic insight. Our aim in the following is to understand what it is about the ^nature^, the ^inner logic^, of money that inclines it to usurp the divine throne, to see precisely how the question concerning the ultimate end of action serves to distinguish the philospher from the sophist, and then to consider what a ^healthy^ love of money would be. As we will see, Plato's interpretation of the significance of money concerns not just teaching, but in fact all human activities.


2. The ontological meaning of money

( ... ... ) But the question of money has a different profile in Plato's philosophy. Moral question, for him, always turn out to be epistemological questions, which in turn are determined by ontological or metaphysical realities.[주]5  In Plato's understanding, the way one acts (virtue) is inevitably a function of what one takes to be real (knowledge), which depends on the various ways reality can present itself─and vice versa. Before we ask how money ought to be used, it is necessary to ask the more fundamental queston what it ^is^. We would suggest that what Plato contributes to the ancient moral tradition regarding money is to reveal that the question at stake here lies deeper than the attitudes of particular individuals: it is first a question of order, and thus a metaphysical question. To show this, we need to explore what Plato says about money within the context of his broader philosophy.

As the Greek thinkers generally affirmed, human beings are naturally social creatures, and, for Plato, money is one of the institutions that makes complex co-existence possible. When Plato has Socrates lay out the most basic social form theoretically conceivable, the initial sketch of the ideal city in ^Republic^ II, money makes an early appearance. There are several things that human beings need by nature, and people tend to differ naturally in their aptitude to provide for one or another of those needs. Rather than each person providing individually for all of his own need─which would eliminate the necessity of society altogether─each does what he does best, and exchange with the others. The manner of exchange, he says, is "buying and selling," and the means that enables the transaction is money, or he puts it here (371b), a [그리스 문자 표기 어휘], which Allan Bloom transaltes as "an established currency as a token for exchange," but which might be more directly rendered as a "conventional symbol for the sake of exchange."[주]6  The existence of this currency, plus the fact that those who produce what is bought and sold do not have the time to wait in the market for the demand for their wares, gives rise to a class of people who do not produce, but rather who work directly with money themselves: the tradesmen (if they buy and sell within their own city) and merchants (if they travel from city to city) (371c-d). According to Socrates, in a "rightly governed city," these will be people unable to produce normally because they are physically weak or useless. In addition to these people who work directly with money, there will be people of strong bodies but weak minds, and so unable to be either producers or tradesmen themselves, who sell their labor. Socrates calls this class of people the "wage-earners."

Now, Socrates refers to this simple social form─constituted mainly by producers, but secondarily by tradesmen and wage-earners─as the "true" city (372e), and appears to be satisfied with it, but Socrates's main dialogue partner in the ^Republic^, Glaucon, raises an objection. According to Glaucon, this city of "utmost necessity" is fit more for pigs than for human beings, that is, it represents a city for purely natural beings that lack the adornments of culture. Socrates is thus prompted to expand what he had initially sketched as the basic form of human community, and the expansion introduces ambiguities. If he calls the first the "true" city, the second is a "feverish" [그리스 문자 어휘] city, one that is inflamed precisely because it is no longer based on natural necessisites, but, as Socrates puts it, on luxuries, that is, on objects of non-necessary desire. ( ... ... ) Socrates observes that such a city will necessarily grow in sie, and lead to conflict with other cities, especially if they too "let themselves go to the unlimited acquisition of money" (372d).

There are two interesting things to note about this initial descrption: ( ... ... ) Now, whether the distinction between necessary and non-necessary desires is the ^same^ as that between good and bad desires is a question to which we will have to return.[주]7  In any event, Plato is suggesting that a city that lacks the internal order of nature will necessarily end up going to war precisely because it has no meaure. In an off-hand way, Socrates remarks that, with the distinction between necessary and non-necessary desie, we have in fact discovered "the origins of war."[주]8

The second thing to note is that Socrates appears, here, to sum up the whole of this order of life in a single phrase, namely, being handed over to "the unlimited acquisition of money." In other words, the love of money appears as the paradigm of a non-necessary and therefore boundless desire. This appearance gets substantialized toward the end of the ^Republic^ when Socrates proceeds to compare the pleasure enjoyed in different orders of life, that is, in lives founded on different objects of desire or kinds of love. There are three basic orders, ( ... ... ... ... )

Once we see that the love of money entails an inversion of means and ends, we can illuminate its significance by connecting it with one of the main recurrent themes in Plato's dialogues, namely, the theme of rhetoric. ( ... ... )

How does this problem illuminate Plato's view of the nature of money? Money is not wealth; it is the ^appearance^ of wealth. ( ... ... )

( ... ... ) We recall that, when Socrates introduced money in the ideal city, it was precisely as a token, as a "symbol" of exchange, and thus as something that has its reality in allowing the transition from one real good to another. When this means is elevated above the actual goods it is meant to enable, it becomes a pseudo-good, a thing in itself that now ^substitutes^ for real wealth.

( ... ... )

Moreover, we ought to now to consider that the same separation gives it a kind of pseudo-divinity, insofar as it makes money both universal and a-temporal. On the one hand, money is utterly indifferent, in itself, as to it use; it is a potential for anything, which is another way of saying that money is "omnipotent." Socrates suggests in book I of the ^Repubic^ that money, as generally understood, is not so much a particular good as it is something that transcends any particular activity and makes one willing to do it, i.e., makes that activity a kind of good, if only in an instrumental sense (more on this later).[주]18  In this respect, it is universal goodness in an abstract sense. On the other hand, its abstraction also makes it timeless in a certain respect. ( ... ... ... )

( ... ) In short, Socrates rejects the idea that money ought to be the "prime mover" of any human activity as a rule. The only good, in fact, that he permits in book I for the engagement in work, it seems, is the negative one, avoidance of punishment. ( ... ... )


출처 3: Anthony F. Natoli. "Socrates and Money: The Translation of Plato, Apology 30b2-4", Mnemosyne (2015) 1-27. 자료.


출처 4: http://www.itulip.com/forums/showthread.php/4320-Socrates-The-Nature-of-Money

※ 원출처가 의심스러운 온라인 게시물.
※ 발췌 (excerpt):

( ... ... )

Socrates:

My dear Amphytrion, banks do not initially need money to lend money. Xerces, borrowed from Babylon banks because he was short in gold coins. The money to build Persepolis was created through promissory notes. Everybody honoured these notes in the civilised world, from the Indian Kingdom of Magadha to the borders of Libya.

( ... ... )
Amphytrion:

This is quite a revelation, Master. But the banks in Babylon could not have created these notes without at least a deposit of gold.

Socrates:

Not quite so. Although an initial deposit and a capital would certainly help, what is crucial is the support of the King. Why would bankers hoard too much gold if nobody asks them for gold in exchange of notes? No rational trader would hoard too much gold. We know very well what happened to the gold hoarded in Egypt, which was robbed even in the most sacred places by invaders, including King Kambyses when he plundered Egypt.

Amphytrion:

But Master, do you mean to say that bankers are able to create money? How can this be?

Socrates:

My dear Amphytrion, money is but the shadow of credit. When the King decides to pay back his initial debt the credit notes are cancelled and money is destroyed. As soon as a new supply of sandalwood is needed, the banks issue new promissory notes at the request of the king, which guarantee that the holder of these notes could ask the banks for a payment in gold. I must stress that these notes are created as a result of a credit granted to the King.

( ... ... )


출처 5: 플라톤. <소크라테스의 변명> 황문수 옮김. 문예 1999. 구글도서

※ 발췌:

( ... ... ) 즉 '위대하고 강력하며 현명한 아테네 시민인 그대, 나의 벗이이여, 그대는 최대한의 돈과 명예와 명성을 쌓아 올리면서 지혜와 진리와 영혼은 최대로 향상하는 것을 거의 돌보지 않고 그러한 일은 전혀 고려하지도 주의하지도 않는 것이 부끄럽지 않은가?'라고 말입니다. ( ... ... ) 내가 돌아다니며 하는 일은 노인이든 청년이든 가리지 않고 여러분의 육신이나 재산을 생각하기에 앞서서 우선적으로 영혼의 최대의 향상을 고려해야 한다고 설득하는 것뿐이기 때문입니다. 나는 여러분에게 돈에서 덕이 생기는 것이 아니라, 공적이든 사적이든 간에 덕에서 돈과 다른 좋은 일 생긴다고 말하는 것입니다. 이것이 내 가르침이며, 만일 이러한 가르침이 청년을 타락시키는 이론이라면 나는 해로운 사람입니다. ( ... ... )


출처 6: 이현우. "소크라테스의 죽음에 숨은 이유", 시사인 2015년 4월 30일.

※ 발췌:

( ... ... ) 가라타니는 제자인 플라톤에 의해 소크라테스의 진의가 왜곡되었다고 보며, 소크라테스와 플라톤의 사상을 분리하고자 한다. 플라톤은 이오니아의 정신과 철학에 대한 비판을 '소크라테스'의 이름으로 수행했지만 ( ... ) 정작 소크라테스는 이오니아의 사상과 정치를 회복하려고 한 마지막 인물이었다는 게 가라타니의 핵심 주장이다.

이오니아란 소아시아 서부의 좁은 해안과 에게 해 동부의 섬들로 이루어진 지역을 가리키는 고대 지명으로 현재는 터키와 그리스의 일부다. 이오니아의 도시국가(폴리스) 시민들은 아테네와 그리스 본토에서 건너온 이민자들로 구성돼 있었는데, 이들은 ( ... ) 자신이 속할 도시를 자발적으로 선택했고, 도시는 이들 간의 사회계약을 통해 성립되었다. 그러면서 시민이 지배자와 피지배자로 분화되지 않은 '무지배' 형태가 탄생했는데, 이 무지배를 '이소노미아'라고 불렀다.

이소노미아는 구성원들의 실질적인 평등에 근거하는데, 이오니아에서 이 평등의 바탕은 시민들의 자유였다. 토지가 없는 자는 타인의 토지에서 일하는 대신 다른 도시로 이주했기에 대토지 소유나 부의 독점이 이루어지지 않았다. 말하자면 ‘자유’가 ‘평등’을 강제했다. 이와는 달리 그리스 본토에서는 화폐경제 발달이 심각한 부의 불균형과 계급 대립을 가져왔다. 이에 대한 대응으로 스파르타에서는 자유를 희생하는 대신에 교역을 폐지해 경제적 평등을 강화하고자 했다. 반면 아테네에서는 시장경제와 자유를 유지한 채 다수인 빈곤층이 소수의 부자로 하여금 부의 재분배를 강제하는 시스템을 만들었는데, 이것이 아테네의 데모크라시(민주정)이다. ( ... ... ) 소크라테스가 아테네 데모크라시에 위협으로 간주돼 사형을 선고받은 것은 그가 의식하지는 않았더라도 이오니아의 이소노미아를 아테네에 다시금 복원하려고 했기 때문이라는 게 가라타니의 재해석이다.

[발췌, 해설] 이시구로, The Remains of the Day

출처 1: Kazuo Ishiguro, The Remains of the Day. Knopf Doubleday Publishing Group, 2010. 구글도서

※ 발췌 (excerpt): pp. 172-173,

( ... ) I had half expected her to be angry at this inquiry, but on the contrary, it was almost as though she had been long awaiting an opportunity to raise the very topic. For she said in something of a relieved way:

'Oh, Mr Stevens, it's just someone I knew once when I was at Granchester Lodge. As a matter of fact, he was the butler there at the time, but now he's left service altogether and is employed by a business near by. He somehow learnt of my being here and started writing to me, suggesting we renew our acquaintance. And that, Mr Stevens, is really long and short of it.'

'I see, Miss Kenton. No doubt, it is refreshing to leave the house at times.'

'I find it so, Mr Stevens.'

There was a short silence. Then Miss Kenton appeared to make some decision and went on:

'This acquaintance of mine. I remember when he was butler at Granchester Lodge, he was full of the most marvellous ambitions. In fact, I imagine his ultimate dream would have been to become butler of a house like this one. Oh, but when I think now of some of his methods! Really, Mr Stevens, I can just imagine your face if you were to be confronted by them now. It really is no wonder his ambitions remained unfulfilled.'

I gave a small laugh. 'In my experience,' I said, 'too many people believe themselves capable of working at these higher levels without having the least idea of the exacting demands involved. It is certainly not suited to just anybody.'

'So true. Really, Mr Stevens, what would you have said if you had observed hem in those days!'

'At these sorts of levels, Miss Kenton, the profession isn't for everybody. It is easy enough to have lofty ambitions, but without certain qualities, a butler will simply not progress beyond a certain point.'

Miss Kenton seemed to ponder this for a moment, then said:

'It occurs to me you must be a well-contented man, Mr Steven. Here you are, after all, at the top of your profession, every aspect of your domain well under control. I really cannot imagine what more you might wish for in life.'

I could think of no immediate response to this. In the slightly awkward silence that ensued, Miss Kenton turned her gaze down into the depths of he cocoa cup as if she had become engrossed by something she had noticed there. In the end, after some consideration, I said:

'As far as I am concerned, Miss Kenton, my vocation will not be fulfilled until I have done all I can to see his lordship through the great tasks he has set himsel. The day his lordship's work is complete, the day ^he^ is able to rest on his laurels, content in the knowledge that he had sone all anyone could ever reasonably ask of him, only on that day, Miss Kenton, will I be able to call myself, as you put it, a well-contented man.'

She may have been a little puzzled by my words; or perhaps it was that they had for some reason depleased her. In any case, her mod seemed to change at that point, and our conversation rapidly lost the rather personal tone it had begun to adopt.

It was not so long afterwards that these meetings over cocoa in her parlour came to an end. In fact, I recall quite clearly the very last time we met like that; I was wishing to discuss with Miss Kenton a forthcoming event─a weekend gathering of a distinguished person from Scotland. It is true the event was still a month or so away, but then it had always been our habit to talk over such events from an early stage. On this particular evening, I had been discussing various aspects of it for a little while when I realized Miss Kenton was contributing very little; indeed, after a time, it became perfectly obvious her thoughts were somewhere else altogether. I did on a few occasions say things like: 'Are you with me, Miss Kenton?' particularly if I had been making a lengthy point, and though whenever I did so she would become a little more alert, within seconds I could see her attention drifting again. ( ... ... )


출처 2: 가즈오 이시구로, <남아 있는 나날> 송은경 옮김. 민음사 펴냄. 2009.7(2017.10. 2판 12쇄).

※ 발췌: 211~213쪽,

( ... ... ) 만에 하나 이런 징후들이 그레이엄 씨의 견해, 즉 켄턴 양이 결혼하기 위해 떠날 생각을 하고 있다는 것을 뒷받침하는 것이 사실이라면, 내게는 이 문제를 좀더 캐 보아야 할 의무가 분명 있었다. 그래서 어느 날 저역 우리의 코코아 모임 자리를 빌어 감히 물어보았다.

"그래, 이번 화요일에도 외출할 생각이오, 켄턴 양? 당신이 쉬는 날 말이오."

이렇게 물으면 화를 발칵 내지 않을까 예상했었는데 오히여 그녀는 이 이야기가 나오기만 학수고대했던 사람처럼, 참았던 것을 토해내듯 말하기 시작했다.

"아, 스티븐스 씨, 그분은 제가 그랜체스터 로지에 있을 때 알았던 사람일 뿐이에요. 당시에는 그 집 집사로 있었지만 지금은 이 직업을 떠나 이 근처의 어느 업체에 근무하고 계시죠. 제가 여기에 있다는 걸 어떻게 알아내고는 편지를 보내오기 시작했는데, 다시 교제해 보자는 식의 내용이었죠. 더도 덜도 보태지 않고 그게 전부예요, 스티븐스 씨."

"그렇군요, 켄턴 양. 이따금 집에서 나가 보는 것도 기분 전환에 좋지요."

"그건 그래요, 스티븐스 씨."

짧은 침묵이 흘렀다. 이윽고 켄턴 양이 뭔가 결심한 듯한 표정으로 말을 이었다.

"방금 말씀드린 제 지인 말인데요. 제 기억으로는 그는 그랜체스터 로지의 집사로 있을 당시 아주 거창한 야심에 차 있었어요. ( ... ... ) 그의 야망이 실현되지 못한 건 지극히 당연해요."

나는 가볍게 웃고 나서 말했다.

"내 경험으로 볼 때도, 이런 높은 수준에 어떤 것들이 요구되는지 정확히 알지도 못하면서 자신의 업무 능력을 과신하는 사람들이 넘 많아요. 어런 일은겨로 아무나 할 수 있는 게 아니죠."

"그렇고말고요. 궁금하기 짝이 없어요, 스티븐스 씨. 만약 당신이 그 당시의 그를 지켜보았다면 과연 뭐라고 하셨을까!"

"켄턴 양, 이런 수준의 전문성은 아무나 감당할 수 있는 게 아닙니다. 높은 야망을 품는 건 어려운 일이 아니지만 확실한 자질을 갖추지 못한다면 집사로서 일정 수준 이상 발전하기는 힘들죠."

켄턴 양은 이 말을 잠시 되씹는 듯하더니 말했다.

"스티븐스 씨, 당신은 정말 스스로 만족할 만한 위치라는 생각이 들어요. 보시다시피 자신의 업에서 최고의 자리에 오르셨고, 자기 분야의 모든 측면들을 속속들이 잘 관리하고 계시니 말입니다. 인생에서 더 이상 바랄 게 뭐가 있을까 싶을 정도예요."

( ... ... ) 이윽고 내가 잠시 생각해 본 뒤 말했다.

"나로 말하자면 켄턴 양, 내가 최선을 다해 노력하여 나리께서 스스로 짊어지신 저 숭고한 과업들이 마무리되는 것을 볼 때까지는 결코 사명을 다했노라고 할 수 없어요. 나리의 과업이 완결되는 날, '그분'께서 합당한 모든 요청에 부응했노라고 흐뭇하게 자부하시며 명예의 월계관을 누리시게 되는 날, 그날에야 비로소 나도 방금 당신이 말한 바와 같은 만족을 느낄 수 있을 거요."

그녀가 내 말에 좀 어리둥절했는지 모른다. 혹은 내 이야기가 어떤 이유로 그녀를 불쾌하게 만들었을 수도 있다. 어쨌거나 그 순간부터 그녀의 기분이 돌변한 듯 보였고, 다소 친밀한 분위기를 타던 우리의 대화도 급격히 분위기가 바뀌었다.

( ... ... )


출처 3: "Passion and Moral Blindness in The Remains of the Day", Chapter 4 in  Anthony Cunningham, The Heart of What Matters: The Role for Literature in Moral Philosophy, University of California Press, 2001. 구글도서

※ 발췌 (excerpt): pp. 95~ ,

Kazuo Ishiguro's ^The Remains of the Day^ is a tragedy, and like any good tragedy, the story invites our interest and sympathy. Knowing how thing can go wrong is crucial for getting things right, and since most of us know only too well how easily things can go awry, we naturally feel for unfortunate sould. Ishiguro's James Stevens, the consummate English butler, is fascinating because he is done by something other than simple ignorance, poor choices, or bad luck. Ultimately, he is compromised by a carefully sustained ideology that echoes longstanding themes in the Western philosophical tradition. Foremost here is Stevens's steadfast conviction that sound judgment and fidelity to what really matters require detachment from the passions.[주]1  In his flight from passion, he unwittingly nurtures a form of moral myopia, an impoverishing moral blindness. By the time Stevens realizes his plight, it is too late to right most of his errant ways. Howver, we've much to learn about moral vision and both the powers and limits of introspection by attending to Stevens's life and character.


I. THE STORY

Perhaps the first thing to note about ^Remains^ is that the tale is an introspective narrative spun by the novel's main character. Thus, bereft of any omniscient narrator in this travel diary, we have good reasons to be duly skeptical. Few of us can entirely escape the temptation to interpret the past selectively in our favor, and even the most detached observer can never see the whole landscape. Nevertheless, there is ample evidence that Stevens works hard to see things clearly, even if he is sometimes slow to draw the conclusions that we cannot avoid. He plods along methodically in his reflections, at times correcting mistaken recollections ( ... ... ) In short, Stevens engagesin nothing less than a Socratic effort to know himself, even if he does not begin with this goal in mind.

( ... ... )

Stevens's unparalleled fidelity to his craft and lord is guided by his commitment to "dignity." Throughout the novel, Stevens struggles to refine a vision of this ideal. His articulation emerges out of two anecdotes about his fater, William Stevens. ( ... ) The common denominator to both stories is William's ability to silence this emotions in the service of professional ends. For James Stevens, emotions are potential threats to the equanimity that are utterly essential to a great butler. ( ... ... )

( ... ... )

As we shall see, Stevens's struggle to embody something like the Stoic ideals of ^ataraxis^ (freedom from emotional disturbance) and ^apartheia^ (passionless detachment) is his ultimate undoing.

Stevens has ample reason to think that he lives true to his ideal of dignity and deserves a place in the pantheon of great English butlers. Darlington's internationl conference in 1923 stands out as a watershed event in his professional development. William Stevens, who has come to work at Darlington Hall in his twilight years, takes ill in the midst of the conference, and Stevens refuses to abandon his duties to remain by his dying father. Instead, he attends to the smooth running of the conference. Miss Kenton, Darlington Hall's housekeeper, offers to attend to Stevens's father and Stevens explains, " 'Miss Kenton, please don't think me unduly improper in not ascending to see my father in his deceased condition just at this moment. You see, I know my father would have wished me to carry on just now. ... To do otherwise, I feel would be let him down' " (^Remains^, 110).  When Stevens recalls this experience early in the novel, he does so with a "large sense of triumph."

Stevens's sense of triumph does not survive the novel. The most obvious factor in his altered self-understanding is the benefit of hindsight. Time demonstrates that Darlington was an unwitting pawn in the Nazi scheme to keep the British at bay while they prepared for conquest. And since a butler's success depends partly upon the moral worth of his house ( ... ... ), Stevens can hardly preserve the same self-assessment. Slowly but surely Stevens backs away from Darlington's defense. At two points he denies having known Darlington, though he tries later to rationalize his denials as something else. By the end of the novel, the best that he can muster is "Lord Darlington wasn't a bad man. He wasn't a bad man at all" (243). This is hardly high praise for his lord, and in a crucial sense as his lord goes, so goes Stevens.

( ... ... )

Finally, there is Stevens's growing awareness, however dim at first, of another path he might have chosen, a different kind of life with Miss Kenton. Stevens's odyssey is really a struggle to appreciate and admit how he squandered his life by forsaking love. By the end of his journey, faced by Kenton for the last time and by the full realization of his mistake for the first time, he finally admits that, "at the moment my heart was breaking"(^Remains^, 239).  ( ... ... )

( ... ... )

Nevertheless, despite Stevens's shield of "professionalism," Kenton perseveres in their relationship and even engages in some good-natured flirtation with Stevens. Stevens himself acknowledges the naughtiness of their playful conversation by stressing that "we would never have carried on in such a vein within the hearing of staff members" (^Remains^, 156). ( ... ... )

( ... ... ) When Stevens addresses the issue with Kenton out of a professional "responsibility to probe the matter further," Kenton informs him "in something of a relieved way" ("it was almost as though she had been long awaiting an opportunity to raise the very topic") that her "acquaintance" is a former butler who once enjoyed aspirations to reach Stevens's professional level but simply hadn't the right stuff (^Remains^, 171-172). And then a crucual interchange follows:

"It occurs to me you must be a well-contented man, Mr Steven. Here you are, after all, at the top of your profession, every aspect of your domain well under control. I really cannot imagine what more you might wish for in life."

I could think of no immediate response to this. In the slightly awkward silence that ensued, Miss Kenton turned her gaze down into the depths of he cocoa cup as if she had become engrossed by something she had noticed there. In the end, after some consideration, I said:

"As far as I am concerned, Miss Kenton, my vocation will not be fulfilled until I have done all I can to see his lordship through the great tasks he has set himsel. The day his lordship's work is complete, the day ^he^ is able to rest on his laurels, content in the knowledge that he had sone all anyone could ever reasonably ask of him, only on that day, Miss Kenton, will I be able to call myself, as you put it, a well-contented man."

She may have been a little puzzled by my words; or perhaps it was that they had for some reason depleased her. In any case, her mod seemed to change at that point, and our conversation rapidly lost the rather personal tone it had begun to adopt.

The blow strikes home. Like Alcibiades desperately searching for some sign that Socrates might have some interest in earthly love, in ^his^ charms and pleasures, Kenton goes fishing and catches a speech about all-consuming professional duty, the very last thing she hoped to hook.

( ... ... ) When she returns and informs him that she had accepted the offer, he extends perfunctory congratuations as he hurries upstairs where "matters of global significance [are] taking place" (^Remains^, 219). And when she later tries to apologize for trying to hurt him back by describing how she and her suitor enjoy laughs at his expense, Stevens utters what may be the most revealing confession in the novel: " '^I have not taken anything you have said to heart, Miss Kenton.^ In fact, I cannot recall what it is you might be referring to. Events of great importance are unfolding upstairs and I can hardly stop to exchange pleasantries with you' " (226; emphasis added).  And so, Kenton leaves Darlington Hall and life goes on for Stevens. Only during the course of his journey, indeed, only with his final meeting with Kenton does the true natue of his quest become clearer to him. ( ... ... )


II. SALVAGING THE REMAINS ( ... ... )


III. THE BIGGER PICTURE ( ... ... )


출처 1: ※ 발췌 (except), pp. 242~ ,

( ... ... ) The man turned his gaze back to the sea again, took a deep breath and sighed contentedly. We then proceeded to sit there together quietly for several moments.

'The fact is, of course,' I said after a while, 'I gave my best to Lord Darlington. I gave him the very best I had to give, and now─well─I find I do not have a great deal more left to give.'

The man said nothing, but nodded, so I went on:

'Since my new employer Mr Farraday arrived, I've tried very hard, very hard indeed, to provide the sort of service I would like him to have. I've tried and tried, but whatever I do I find I am far from reaching the standards I once set myself. More and more errors are appearing in my work. Quite trivial in themselves─at least so far. But they're of the sort I would never have made before, and I know what they signify. Goodness knows, I've tried and tried, but it's no use. I've given what I had to give. I gave it all to Lord Darlington.'

'Oh dear, mate. Here, you want a hankle? I've got one somewhere. Here we are. It's fairly clean. Just blew my nose once this morning, that's all. Have a go, mate.'

'Oh dear, no, thank you, it's quite all right. I'm very sorry, I'm afraid the travelling has tired me. I'm very sorry.'

'You must have been very attached to this Lord whatever. And it's three years since he passed away, you say? I can see you were very attached to him, mate.'

'Lord Darlington wasn't a bad man. He wasn't a bad man at all. And at least he had the privilege of being able to say at the end of his life that he made his own mistakes. His lordship was a courgageous man. He chose a certain path in life, it proved to be a misguided one, but there, he chose it, he can say that at least. As for myself, I cannot even claim that. You see, I trusted. I trusted in his lordship's wisdom. All those years I served him, I trusted I was doing something worthwhile. I can't even say I made my own mistakes. Really─one has to ask oneself─what dignity is there in that?'

'Now, look, mate, I'm not sure I follow everything you're saying. But if you ask me, your attitude's all wrong, see? Don't keep looking back all the time, you're bound to get depressed. And all right, you can't do your job as well as you used to. But it's the same for all of us, see? We've all got to put our feet up at some point. Look at me. Been happy as a lark since the day I retired. All right, so neither of us are exactly in our first flush of youth, but you've got to keep looking forward.' And I believe it was then that he said: 'You've got to enjoy yourself. The evening's the best part of the day. You've done your day's work. Now you can put your feet up and enjoy it. That's how I look at it. Ask anybody, they'll all tell you. The evening's the best part of the day.'


출처 2: ※ 발췌, 298~300쪽

( ... ... ) 노인은 다시 바다로 시선을 돌리더니 숨을 깊이 들이켜 흡족하게 한숨을 내쉬었다. 그리고 얼마간 우리는 말없이 나란히 앉아 있었다.

내가 먼저 입을 열었다.

"사실 나는, 달링턴 경께 모든 걸 바쳤습니다. 내가 드려야 했던 최고의 것을 그분께 드렸지요. 그러고 나니 이제 나란 사람은 줄 것도 별로 남지 않았구나 싶답니다."

노인은 아무 말 없이 고개만 끄덕였으므로 나는 계속 말했다.

"새 주인인 패러데이 어르신께서 도착하신 후로 내 나름대로 정말 열심히, 무던히도 애써 왔습닏. 그분께서 받아 마땅하다고 생각되는 수준으로 봉사를 하려고 말입니다. 그런데 노력하고 노력했지만 무슨 일을 하든 지난날 내가 설정했던 기준들에 한참 미달해 있는 나 자신을 발견하게 됩니다. 나의 직업에서 점점 더 많은 실수들이 나타나고 있어요. 지극히 사소한 것들이죠. 적어도 지금까지는 말입니다. 그러나 예전 같았으면 결코 저지르지 않았을 실수들이에요. 그게 무엇을 의미하는지 저는 잘 압니다. 나는 맹세코 노력하고 노력했지만 아무 소용이 없어요. 나는 주어야 했던 것을 줘 버렸습니다. 달링턴 나리께 모두 줘 버렸지요."

"저런, 형씨. 손수건이 필요해요? 내가 어디 넣어 가지고 왔는데, 아, 여기 있군. 아주 깨끗한 거라오. 아침에 내가 코만 한 번 풀었어요. 이걸 써요, 형씨."

"아니, 괜찮아요. 고맙지만 됐습니다. 미안합니다. 여행을 하다 보니 좀 지쳤나 봅니다. 정말 미안하게 됐어요."

"그 나리인가 뭔가 하는 양반한테 애착이 컸던 것 같군요. 돌아가신 지 3년째라고 했죠? 내가 볼 때 그 양반한테 너무 집착했어요, 형씨."

"달링턴 나리는 나쁜 분이 아니셨어요. 전혀 그런 분이 아니었습니다. 그리고 그분에게는 생을 마감하면서 당신께서 실수했다고 말씀하실 수 있는 특권이라도 있었지요. 나리는 용기 있는 분이셨어요. 인생에서 어떤 길을 택하셨고 그것이 잘못된 길로 판명되긴 했지만 최소한 그 길을 택했노라는 말씀을 하실 수 있습니다. 나로 말하자면 그런 말조차 할 수가 없어요, 알겠습니까? 나는 '믿었어요.' 나리의 지혜를. 그 긴 세월 그분을 모셔 오면서 내가 뭔가 가치 있는 일을 하고 있다고 믿었지요. 나는 실수를 저질렀다는 말조차 할 수 없습니다. 여기에 정녕 무슨 품위가 있단 말인가 하고 나는 자문하지 않을 수 없어요."

"이봐요, 형씨. 내가 당시늬 이야기를 제대로 이해한 건지 어떤지는 모르겠소만, 만약 나한테 묻는다면 이런 태도는 정말 잘못되었다고 말하고 싶어요, 알겠어요? 만날 그렇게 뒤만 돌아보아선 안 됩니다.

[T. S. 엘리엇, 네 사중주] 세 번째 시에 대한 학습 참고서 읽기

cf. 일부 자료 발췌
cf. 일부 링크 메모
cf. 네 사중주의 일부에 대한 어떤 한국어 해설

※ 출처 1: https://www.shmoop.com/four-quartets/dry-salvages-section-1-summary.html

※ 발췌 (excerpt):

─ Epigraph:

The Dry Salvages─presumably les trois sauvages─is a small group of rocks, with a beacon, of the N.E. coast of Cape Ann, Massachusetts. Salvages is pronounced to rhyme with assuages. Groaner: a whistling buoy.

• ( ... ) The speaker gives his only explanatory note of the entire "Fout Quartets," telling us that "The Dry Salvages" is a rock formation off the coast of St. Ann, Massachusetts (where Eliot spent time as a child). ( ... ) Also, the speak explains that a "Groaner" is a type of buoy, and not a terrible pun or lame joke ( ... ).

─ Lines 390-394:

I do not know much about gods; but I think that the river
Is a strong brown god─sullen, untamed and intractable,
Patient to some degree, at first recognized as a frontier;
Useful, untrustworthy, as a conveyor of commerce;
Then only a problem confronting the builder of bridges.

• The speaker thinks that the rive is a type of "brown god" ( ... ) The image of a rive is appropriate, considering all the stuff the speaker has said about language and words not staying still in "East Coker." To clarify, meaning is like a rive to the speaker, always flowing. Like the Greek philosopher Heraclitus oce wrote, "You can't step into the same rive twice," ( ... )

• At the same time, the speak recognizes that the rive-god is "[p]atient to some degree," since it has allowed us to throw meanings onto it that have managed to stick for a century or two (after all, we're still using the periodic table, right?).

• ( ... ... ) What the speaker is getting at here is that we used to work with nature out of necessity. But in modern times, we build bridges over nature in order to avoid thinking about it. ( ... )

Lines 395-399:

The problem once solved, the brown god is almost forgotten
By the dwellers in cities─ever, however, implacable,
Keeping his seasons and rages, destroyer, reminder
Of what men choose to forget. Unhonoured, unpropitiated
By worshippers of the machine, but waiting, watching and waiting.

• Once we've solved the problem of dealing with the dumb river (personified here as a "brown god") we build cities and pretty much forget about it─and about nature─altogether. That said, the river is still there, washing out roads every now and then with "his seansons and rages." In its ability to destroy roads, the river also reminds us of what we "choose to forget," which is that we're connected to the natural world and all of the stuff we build is going to go away someday, along with us (don't forget the message of "East Coker").

• We might go on worshipping technology and machines all we want, but the natural world─like the river─will always be waiting for us, lurking and watching as we grow old and our building eventually fall down. In the end, we might try to conquer nature, but we'll never succeed.

Lines 400-403:

His rhythm was present in the nursery bedroom,
In the rank ailanthus of the April dooryard,
In the smell of grapes on the autumn table,
And the evening circle in the winter gaslight.

• Even when we're little children shut up in our nurseries, the river-god's "rhythm" is there with us. After all, we're still animals of nature, and we still have nature' rhythms inside us ( ... )

• The rhythm of the river is also present in the "rank ailanthus of the April dooryard / In the smell of grapes on the autumn table / And the evening circle in the winter gaslight." Basically, the speaker is saying here that all things, like the flower ailanthus or the smell of grapes, are connected to the river. ( ... )

Lines 404-410:

  The river is within us, the sea is all about us;
The sea is the land's edge also, the granite
Into which it reaches, the beaches where it tosses
Its hints of earlier and other creation:
The starfish, the horseshoe crab, the whale's backbone;
The pools where it offers to our curiosity
The more delicate algae and the sea anemone.

• No matter how we try to deny the fat that we're connected to the natural world (which is always changing), "the river is within us." After this, the speaker switches to the image of the sea to show how inescapable nature is. ( ... )

• In addition, the sea is "the land's edge," which is true in the literal sense, but also in the metaphorical sense, if we think of the sea as the untamed wild and the land as the realm of human civilization.

• The sea (nature) is always reaching into our human realm, eroding things until they're gone and tossing "Its hints of earlier and other creation:/ The starfish, the horseshoe crab." In other words, nature reminds us of simple, unthinking organisms, and it might remind us that we're not so far off from those organisms, no matter how much credit we like to give ourselves.

• The sea also leaves tidal pools, which we can look into and find "The more delicate algae and the sea anemone." Here, the speaker is no doubt describing all of the things he might have found on the beach when he was a little boy vacationing in Massachusetts. But ( ... ) deep down, he's just a simple creature (like a starfish). ( ... )

Lines 411-416:

It tosses up our losses, the torn seine,
The shattered lobsterpot, the broken oar
And the gear of foreign dead men. The sea has many voices,
Many gods and many voices.
                           The salt is on the briar rose,
The fog is in the fir tress.

• Literally speaking, the sea destroys anything we might try to put into it, shattering our lobsterpots and breaking our oars and nets (a "seine" is a kind of fishing net). Metaphorically speaking, nature destroys any type of meaning or pattern we try to layer onto it. Lying at the bottom of the sea is "the gear of foreign dead men," which means that these men are made anonymouns by the swallowing power of the sea. Basically, the sea is like a god because it's so infinitely larger and more powerful than anything humans will ever be able to come up with.

• The sea is in fact so big that not only one god, but a whole bunch of gods live inside its waves. The sea, the speaker tells us, "has many voices," meaning that you can't pin it down by giving it a single name like Neptune or Poseidon. The sea gets into everything. Its salt gets into the air and settles on "the briar rose," while its fog rises off the water and gets into the "fir trees."

• These images show that the sea (and the natural forces it represents) are always pushing into the realm of human life (i.e., land), always remind us of the natural world.

Lines 417-424:

                   The sea howl
And the sea yelp, are different voices
Often together heard: the whine in the rigging,
The menace and caress of wave that breakes on water,
The distant rote in the granite teeth,
And the wailing warning from the approaching headland
Are all sea voices, and the heaving groaner
Rounded homewards, and the seagull:

• More and more groaning fills our ears, as wailing sounds seem to come from the sea in these lines. Yet they do not all mean the same thing. As the speaker says, "The sea howl / And the sea yelp, are different voices / Often together heard." Again, he's undercutting our desire to think that the sea is one giant entity with one voice. He's making it into a plural thing, which makes it tough for us to pin it down.

• Even the sound of buoys (which is meant to keep boats from hitting them) joins in this general wailing, which─if we remember "East Coker"─could also represent the wailing of our own mortality, since the devouring power of the sea ( ... )

Lines 425-431:

And under the oppression of the silent fog
The tolling bell
Measures time not our time, rung by the unhurried
Ground swell, a time
Older than the time of chronometers, older
Than time counted by anxious worried women
Lying awke, calculating the future,

• The silent fog of the sea oppresses us by reminding us of how temporary and unimportant human lives are in the eyes of nature. Then we hear a "tolling bell," which could be the bell on a buoy out at sea. This bell "measures time not our time," which is the time of the natural world, which thinks in terms of thousand- or million-year periods unlike the minute- or day-long perionds we humans tend to think about.

• The time of nature is a time "Older than the time of chronometers" or older than human-made clocks, and older than the time "counted by anxious women / Lying awake, calculating the future." This last line makes it [seem] as though there's no real point at all to humans worrying about their futures, since these futures will all end up in the same place anyway, which is death. ( ... )

Lines 432-439:

Trying to unweave, unwind, unravel
And piece together the past and the futre,
Between midnight and dawn, when the past is all deception,
The future futureless, before the morning which
When time stops and time is never ending;
And the ground swell, that is was from the beginnign,
Clangs
The bell.

• The "anxious women" who represent human anxiousness in general are seen here "[t]ryig to unweave, unwind, unravel / And piece together the past and the future." This line could suggest that all human attempts to make sense of life will be useless until they come to terms with the fact that they are going to die someday.

• When we try to make sense of our lives on our terms─or in other words, on egocentric terms─we tend to come up empty. In this situation, all of our attempts to make sense of the past are "all deception," since it's just our own desires we're projecting onto the past. Further, our future is totally futureless because there are no plans we can make that will change the fact that we're going to die.

• Finally, Seciton 1 ends with the clanging of a bell, which is the sound that marks the end of our time here on Earth. This is the only thing we really need to focus on, ( ... ... )

II

Lines 440-445:

Where is there an end of it, the soundless wailing,
The silent withering of autumn flowers
Dropping their petals and remainging motionless;
Where is there an end to the drifting wreckage,
The prayer of the bone on the beach, the unprayable
Prayer at the calamitous annunciation?

• Here, the speaker's asking about when our suffering will end. When will we get past all of this wailing and wreckage? The rest of these lines continue in the same vein with images (wilting flowers, bone) associated with death─except for the last past about the "unprayable / Prayer at the annunication," which kind of comes a little out of left field.

• First of all, why would the annunciation (where the archangel Michael told the Virgin Mary she's going to give birth to Jesus) be a "calamitous" thing? ( ... ... )

• With all that said, it's good to know that, unlike "Burnt Norton" or "East Coker," Eliot was writing "The Dry Salvages" right smack in the middle of World War II, when the Nazis were bombing England on a daily basis. So here, the speaker might actually be wondering when the suffering of the war will end, but also wondering if the end of the war will bring about any kind of spiritual rebirth.

Lines 446-451:

  There is no end, but addition: the trailing
Consequence of further days and hours,
While emotions takes to itself the emotionless
Years of living among the breakage
Of what was believed in as the most reliable─
And therefore the fittest for renunciation.

• Well, it turns out that maybe there is no end to all of our suffering, only "addition" to it. After all, we can never forget or escape our pasts, just like we can't escape "the trailing / Consequence of further days and hours." Like a river, time is always flowing.

• But unlike a river, life keeps piling up memories and events that become part of us, and we have to deal with that.

• Why would this piling up be a bad thing? Because ( ... ). During this phase, you might grow cold in a way you can never escape, as "emotion takes to itself the emotionless / Years of living among the breakage." This breakage ( ... ) but the metaphorical breakage "Of what was believed in as the most reliable," meaning the symbols and beliefs that had significance in the past. Now we're right back in the rubble of "The Waste Land," picking our way through the shattered beliefs of the past with our old buddy T.S. Eliot, thw world's most sullen tour guide.

• That said, the speaker adds a final line here that would never fit with "The Waste Land," saying that all of the things we once thought we could rely on are "therefore the fittest for renunciation." Changing his tune from his younger days, he says we especially have to start letting go of the beliefs and values we prize most deeply, because it's only after losing everything that we might be able to start rebuilding our spiritual lives.

Lines 452-457:

  There is the final addition, the failing
Pride or resentment at failing powers,
The unattached devotion which might pass for devotionless,
In a drifting boat with a slow leakage,
The silent listening to the undeniable
Clamour of the bell of the last annunciation.

• It's only when we have nothing that we're able to start over and create something good. The speaker thinks of our final loss as our "final addition" ( ... ) This "final addition" is therefore the failure of our pride and our resentment at "failing powers," or thing we once thought were powerful.

• More specifically, the speaker might feel resentment at the "failing power" of England for getting beaten up so badly by Germany. ( ... )

• Further, we need to "unattach" our devotion and almost start to look hopeless if we're going to hit rock-bottom ( ... ). In modern times we're all "In a drifting boat with a slow leakage," meaning that we're constantly stranded and sinking. And finally, we must continue to listen silently to the sound of the bell that reminds us that we're going to die ( ... )

Lines 458-463:

  Where is the end of them, the fishermen sailing
Into the wind's tail, where the fog cowers?
We cannot think of a time that is oceanles
Or of an ocean not littered with wastage
Or of a future that is not liable
Like the past, to have no destination.

• Again, the speaker asks, "Where is the end of it all?" Where is the end of all our sailing on stormy seas? We can't think of a time that doesn't have an ocean (an abyss of nature that conquers us way more than we conquer it). We can't think of a time when this void-like ocean isn't filled with the "wastage" of our failed and vain human projects.

• Never will we have a future that has a clear destinatin and purpose. All things lead to death, and for like the 138th time, the speaker implies that this isn't that bad of a thing. He's just trying to make us give up our conventional desires so we can replace them with more spiritual ones.

Lines 464--469:

  We have to think of them as forever bailing,
Setting and hauling, while the North East lowers
Over shallow banks unchanging and erosionless
Or drawing their money, drying sails at dockage;
Not as making a trip that will be unpayable
For a haul that will not bear examination.

• If we think of ourselves as a bunch of folks on a leaking boat (and yes, the speaker wants us to do this) then we have to think of ourselves as "forever bailing." The work of trying to keep ourselves and our culture afloat is neverending, and there's no point in trying to make it end.

• We have to think of the fishermen (ourselves) as coming to shore to draw their money from their bank savings because they're losing money, or as drying their sails on the dock, a repetitive activity that they'll never escape having to to over and over again for as long as they live.

• What we can't do is think of ourselves as "making a trip that will be unpayable / For a haul that will not bear examination."

• These lines paint a metaphorical scene of fishermen going out to sea for a fishing trip they'll never be paid for, for a "haul" of fish that no fish buyer will ever examine. In other words, we need to find a way to embrace our neverending struggle without completely giving into feelings of hopelessness or giving up. Most peopel, implies the speaker, will probably give up instead of accept and endless struggle, but we must try to avoid this.

Lines 470-475:

  There is no end of it, the voiceless wailing,
No end to the withering of withered flowers,
To the movement of pain that is painless and motionless,
To the drift of the sea and the drifting wreckage,
The bone's prayer to Death its God. Only the hardly, barely payable
Prayer of the one Annunciation.

• ( ... ) There's no end to the sound of "voiceless wailing" that marks our suffering. There's no end to the withering of flowers, meaning that there's no end to death and decay.

• There's no end to the sense of drifting we get in our lives, the sense that we lack direction.

• There is no end to the prayer that our mortal bones make to Death, which is actually our God, since it haunts everything we do. The only end we could possible see to these things is the prayer we can just barely make to the "one Annunciation" of Christianity, which promises us that we'll get into heaven and have eternal life when we die. ( ... ... )

Lines 476-480:

  It seems, as one becomes older,
That the past has another pattern, and ceases to be a mere sequence─
Or even development: the latter a partial fallacy
Encouraged by superficial notions of evolution,
Which becomes, in the popular mind, a means of disowning the past.

• As we grow older, we start to realize that history isn't just a story of ongoing progess. It "has another pattern," and isn't just some "sequence." This belief comes from our "superficial notions of evolution," which lead us to think that we're somehow improving ourselves as time goes on. But in the end, this is just a wasy of "disowning the past." If we believe in evolution, then we don't really worry about the past all that much, because all that matters are the improvements that evolution is always making on us.

• By forgetting the past, though, we turn away from the proof that we ^aren't^ getting better. If anything, suggests the speaker, history has just been one giant mess of suffering.

• History note: ( ... ... )

• Now on with our show. If we're ever going to make our lives better, says our speaker, it's not going to come from forgetting about the past or clinging to some idea of constant human progess. It's going to come from humility and from accepting the natural cycle of birth and death that we're all a part of.

Lines 481-487:

The moments of happiness─not the sense of well-being,
Fruition, fulfillment, security or affection,
Or even a very good dinner, but the sudden illumination─
We had the experience but missed the meaning,
And approach to the meaning restores the experience
In a different form, beyond any meaning
We can assign to happiness.

• Our moments of happiness have a deep meaning, but this meaning is something we miss if all we think about is our own happiness. For example, our moments of happiness don't just consist in the "sense of welling, / Fruition, fulfillment, security or affection, / or even a very good dinner." Rather, our feelings of well-being are basically just as temporary and superficial as our enjoyment of a good meal.

• What matters to the speaker is the "sudden illumination." We have had an experience of something deeper, he says, but we "missed the meaning" because we didn't look for it properly. Further, if we actually manage to approach this deeper meaning in our lives, this meaning completely brings back or "restores" our past experiences "In a different form." This new form is something completely different from anything we've experienced, because it's beyond "any meaning / We can assign to happiness."

• ( ... ... )

Lines 487-494:

I have said before
That the past experience revived in the meaning
Is not the experience of one life only
But of many generations─not forgetting
Something that is probably quite ineffable:
The backward look behind the assurance
Of recorded history, the backward half-look
Over the shoulder, towards the primitive terror.

• ( ... ... )

• In our "backward look" to the past, we glimpse something beyond the normal, comfortable "assurance / Of recorded history."

• We see something scarier than what the textbooks tell us about the past. We can look on this directly, so we can only give it a "backward half-look / Over the shoulder." And the thing we end up looking on (without being able to express it) is a form of primitive terror. ( ... ... )

Lines 495-501:

Now, we come to discover that the moments of agony
(Whether, or not, due to misunderstanding,
Having hoped for the wrong things or dreaded the wrong things,
Is not in question) are likewise permanent
With such permanence as time has. We appreciate this better
In the agony of others, nearly experienced,
Involving ourselves, than in our own.

• We also come to realize that, like our moments of happiness, our moments of agony stay with us in a nearly permanent way, becoming part of who we are. It doesn't matter what caused these moments of pain, whether it was a misunderstanding or "Having hoped for the wrong things or dreaded the wrong things." What matters is that we tend to gain an appreciation for how much agony changes people when we see it in others. We don't see it changing ourselves to the same degree. ( ... ... )

Lines 502-508:

For our own past is covered by the current of action,
But the torment of others remains an experience
Unqualified, unworn by subsequent attrition.
People change, and smile: but the agony abides.
Time the destroyer is time the preserver,
Like the river with its cargo of dead negroes, cows and chicken coops,
The bitter apple and the bite in the apple.

• We might not realize how much our pasts have changed us because in our own pasts, we tend to remember things that have happened and actions we have taken. Bue when we look to the "torment of others" we can see very clearly (probably more clearly than those people) how pain has shaped them, how it stays with them even after years of trying to get over it. People change, and we might see them smile when we meet them, but we know that "the agony abides" inside them.

• Even though the speaker's been talking about how time tends to knock down buildings and destroy all of our attempts to make something permanent, it also has a way of preserving the stuff that we'd like to get rid of: like pain. In this sense, "Time the destroyer is [also] time the preserver."

• The same is the case even for the river, which is a symbol of endless change, and yet the river still contains the history of allthe "dead negroes, cows, and chicken coops" it has washed away. In other words, the fact that the river is constantly washing things away doesn't wash away the fact that the Western world has a horrifying history of slavery, which the speaker alludes to with his comment about the "dead negores," who were once treated no bettern than farm animals like cows and chickens, or worse.

Lines 509-514:

And the ragged rock in the restless waters,
Waves wash over it, fogs conceal it;
On a halcyon day it is merely a monument,
In a navigable weather it is always a seamark
To lay a course by: but in the somber season
Or the sudden fury, is what it always was.

• In the final lines of Section 2, the speaker appears to directly reference the formation of sea rocks that this poem is named for. They appear to be something that is totally unmoving even as the waters around them are "restless." Waves can wash over the rock all they want, and fogs can conceal it, but it's still there, sticking out like something that'll never change.

• It can sometimes serve as a monument "On a halcyon day," meaning that it can be a monument to happier and more youthful times, a halcyon being a type of kingfisher bird that─according to a legend─makes a nest that floats on the sea (checkout our analysis of the kingfisher in lines 136-139) 

• In "navigating weather" (or in other words, when things are going pretty well), this unchanging rock is a seamark that we can use to figure out what direction we want to head in. At this point, we should probably realize that the rock isn't just a rock, but a symbol for some unchanging principle in our lives that we can use to remember the past or to figure out where we want to go in the future.

• But when times are gloomy or violent, "in the somber season / Or the sudden fury," this rock is "what is always was," which is nothing except an unmoving shape in the middle of a restless sea. ( ... ... )

III

Lines 515-520:

I sometimes wonder if that is what Krishna meant─
Among other things─or one way of putting the same thing:
That the future is a faded song, a Royal Rose or a lavender spray
Of wistful regret for those who are not yet here to regret,
Pressed between yellow leaves of a book that has never been opened.
And the way up is the way down, the way forward is the way back.

• The speaker continues to struggle with all of the contradictions that he faces when he tries to talk about something he knows is inexpressible. His energy starts to wane a little here, and he starts to wonder about the true meaning of something said by Krishna, one of the primary avatars of the Hindu god Vishnu.

• When it comes to wondering about what Vishnu meant, the speaker is wondering if everything he (the speaker) has said in Section 2 can be linked to the spiritual teachings of Krishna. For example, he wonders if "the future is faded song," meaning that it's just going to be a time of regret for those who aren't around (who haven't been born) to regret yet.

• He wonders if the future is actually a time of sadness that no one really cares about, "Pressed between the yellow leaves of a book that has never been opened." He further wonders if we truly wish to elevate our spirits, "the way up is the way down, they way forward is the way back." These questions actually bring us all the way back to the beginning of "Burnt Norton," where the speaker's second epigraph comes from the Greek philosopher Heraiclus, translating as, "The way upward and the way downward is one and the same." Here, we see the speaker continue to struggle with the unsayable meaning of life by talking in riddles and contradictions. He does this quite frankly because life itself is a bundle of contradictions, and the more he writes like this, the more the speaker wonders if he's just saying the same stuff that the Hindu religion said thousands of years ago.

Lines 521-527:

You cannot face it steadily, but this thing is sure,
That time is no healer: the patient is no longer here.
When the train starts, and the passengers are settled
To fruit, periodicals and business letters
(And those saw them off have left the platform)
Their faces relax from grief into relief,
To the sleepy rhythm of a hundred hours.

• Whatever it is that the speaker's been trying to get at (death, the rock, the inexpressible, etc.), he says "You cannot face steadily." But, in spite of this, one thing is sure, and that's that "time is no healer." Why can't time heal us? Well, because the person who needs to be healed no longer exists, because we're constantly changing in the flow of time. That's why he says that "the patient is no longer here," because, from moment to moment, the person we once were disappears and is replaced by another person, then another.

• The speaker uses the image of a train to once again symbolize the forward-moving, single-track way that most modern people approach their lives. We all get into a train in our own lives when we settle into our routines and focus on our personal goals.

• When we do this, we stop thinking about others in the same way that train passengers, after a moment of grief, relax "into relief" and settle into their snacks (fruit), entertainment (periodicals), and work (business letters). The overall effect of our routine, though, is numbness, and the speaker emphasizes this by showing that the train passengers relax into "the sleepy rhythm of a hundred hours."

Lines 528-535:

Fare forward, travellers! not escaping from the past
Into different lives, or into any future;
You are not the same people who left that station
Or who will arrive at any terminus,
While the narrow rails slide together behind you,
Watching the furrow that widens behind you,
You shall not think "the past is finished"
Or "the future is before us."

• On the one hand, we don't escape the past as we move forward on the journey of our lives. Further, we don't escape into some completely different life, or into the future, even though we're never the same person we were a few minutes ago (when we left the station), and we're not the same person we'll be a few munutes in the future (when we arrive at any terminus). As we move forward, we won't be able to say that the past is finished or that the future is coming.

• As you might have already noticed, the speaker finds it much easier to say what the nature of life ^isn't^ ("Don't look ahead. Don't look back.") more than he can say what it ^is^. Every time he starts to say, "Well it's kind of like this," he has to backtrack and say the opposite. It seems like the closer we get to the heart of things, the more unavoidably contracdictory we get.

Lines 536-541:

At nightfall, in the rigging and the aerial,
Is a voice descanting (though not the ear,
The murmuring shell of time, and not in any language)
“Fare forward, you who think that you are voyaging;
You are not those who saw the harbour
Receding, or those who will disembark.

• Now all of a sudden we're back to the nautical imagery. As we continue on our life's voyage (this time on a boat and out at sea), we can here the murmuring of a shell, which if you've ever heard it is like an endless, droning hum. The message of this wordless hum is pretty much the same as the speaker just told us: we're not the same person we were a moment ago (when we saw the harbour) or the people we'll be in the future (those who will disembark).

• In this sense, we only "think [we] are voyaging," although whether or not we're actually getting anywhere is uncertain. After all, if we're always changing from one moment to the next, can we really say that it's "us" who will arrive somewhere in the future? Think about it ( ... )

Lines 542-544

Here between hither and the farther shore
While time is withdrawn, consider the future
And the past with an equal mind.

• Between the moment you just left behind and the one that's approaching, says our speaker, make sure to consider both the past and the future in the same way, or "with an equal mind." There's no point in emphasizing the past with unnecessary nostalgia, or the future with unnecessary faith in progress. Just think of them both in the context of the moment you're living in ^right now^.

Lines 545-552:

At the moment which is not of action or inaction
You can receive this: ‘on whatever sphere of being
The mind of a man may be intent
At the time of death’─that is the one action
(And the time of death is every moment)
Which shall fructify in the lives of others:
And do not think of the fruit of action.
Fare forward.

• In a moment where you aren't really acting or not acting, you can receive the great message that every single moment of your life is the moment of your death. Wha? This might sound really depressing, but what it really means is that your life is totally meaningful every second of every day because you might die at any moment. It's kind of like what people are getting at when they sayto live every day like it was your last. Well, that's what the speaker is saying here. He's telling you to live every minute like it's your last.

• This is what he means when he writes that "the time of death is every moment." He further says that realizing this truth is the only thing that will bring goodness to the people around us. We will "not think of the fruit of action" because we won't be thinking about ourselves so much anymore. The more we pay attention to the fact that we'll die, the less inclined we'll be able to do things for ourselves.

• With this piece of advice in our minds, the speaker tells us to "Fare forward" on our life's journey while trying to stay humble and connected to our own mortality. We're getting tons of advice here. We hope you're taking notes.

Lines 553-560:

              O voyagers, O seamen,
You who come to the port, and you whose bodies
Will suffer the trial and judgment of the sea,
Or whatever event, this is your real destination.”
So Krishna, as when he admonished Arjuna
On the field of battle.
                        Not fare well,
But fare forward, voyagers.

• The speaker understands that all of us, like sailor, will suffer from a lot of hardship, just like "the trial and judgment of the sea." But no matter what happens, "this" is our "real destination." "This" probably refers to an experience in which we can be intimately connected to the moment (or at least realization) of our own death at every moment.

• Here, we also realize that we've been getting a straight quotation from the Hindu god Krishna since the single quotation mark back in line 546. The speaker has been quoting from the lesson that Krishna teaches Arjuna on the "field of battle" in Hindu Holy Scripture. What Krishna hopes to teach Arjuna in this quotation is the importance of acting without thinking about how one's actions will benefit oneself. Like Arjuna, we must all learn to act in a way that reflects our spiritual respect for death. If we do this, we will become humble, giving, and good people.

• At the end of the Section 3, the speaker is not promising us a pleasant journey, so he won't say "fare well." He'll only say, "Fare forward" as he keeps encouraging us to press onward in our spiritual education.

출처 2: http://www.sparknotes.com/poetry/eliot/section9.rhtml

( ... ... ) The third section of the poem ruminates on words attributed to Krishna, advising humanity not to "fare well" but to "fare forward." This is an exhortation to give up aspirations─to stop seeking to do "well"─and to be satisfied with mere existence. ( ... ... )


출처 3: 영문학산책3[1].hwp


행동의 열매를 생각하지 말라, 앞으로 가라.
And do not think of the fruit of action. / Fare forward.
잘 가지 말고, 앞만 보고 가라, 항해자들이여!
Not fare well, / But fare forward, voyagers!

행위의 결과에 대한 집착을 포기하고
항시 만족하며, 아무것에도 의존하지 않는 사람은
행위에 관여한다 할지라도
아무것도 행하지 않는 사람이다.

Abandoning all attachment to the results of his activities,
ever satisfied and independent,
he performs no fruitive action
although engaged in all kinds of undertakings. (바가바드 기타. 4:20)

주어지는 대로 만족하며
모든 대립을 초월하여
선망 없이
성공이나 실패에 있어서 평등한 사람은
행위한다 해도 속박되지 않는다.

He who is satisfied with gain which coms of its won accord,
who is free from duality and does not envy,
who is equipoised both in success and failure,
is never entangled, although performing actions.


출처 4: T.S. Eliot: Poetry, Plays and Prose (Sunil Kumar Sarker. Atlantic Publishers & Dist, 2000 )

( ... ... ) In the third movement, Eliot asks men, the voyagers, the seamen, to remember the advice of Krishna to Arjuna, to get release from the pain of this world, and to receive salvation. The poet says that the past and the present are moving towards the future. Life is a flow, a non-stop flow, like the river. So, it is useless to wait for the things of the past or to desire things for the future, for the future will, in the course of time, become the past. He says that "the future is a faded song" and so one should not wait for time to get one's desires fulfilled. When one settles on one's seat in a train and the train begins to run for its destination, one can "relax from grief into relief", because he (somehow) as if resigns himself to the train. In the same way, one should resign oneself to the course of life, to the course of time. Lord Krishna ( ... ) said to Arjuna that whatever one thinks intently on at the time of his death, that he attains to after his death. It may be that he himself does not get that what he had been contemplating upon at the time of his death, but others may get the same thing for his intending. However, Eliot asks us, the voyagers, not to "think of the fruit of action" but to move on and move on, as Krishna persuaded Arjuna to do. Therefore, say Eliot, "Not fare well, /But fare forward, voyagers."

The third movement of 'The Dry Salvages' runs thus:

III

I sometimes wonder if that is what Krishna meant─
Among other things─or one way of putting the same thing:
That the future is a faded song, a Royal Rose or a lavender spray
Of wistful regret for those who are not yet here to regret,
Pressed between yellow leaves of a book that has never been opened.
And the way up is the way down, the way forward is the way back.
You cannot face it steadily, but this thing is sure,
That time is no healer: the patient is no longer here.
When the train starts, and the passengers are settleed
To fruit, periodicals and business letters
(And those who saw them off have left the platform)
Their faces relax from grief into relief,
To the sleepy rhythm of a hundred hours.
Fare forward, travellers! not escaping from the past
Into different lives, or into any future;
You are not the same people who left the station
Or who will arrive at any terminus,
While narrowing rails slide together behind you;
And on the deck of the drumming liner
Watching the furrow that widens behind you,
You shall not think 'the past is finished'
Or 'the future is before us'.
At nightfall, in the rigging and the aerial,
Is a voice descanting (though not to the ear,
The murmuring shell of time, and not in any language)
‘Fare forward’, you who think that you are voyaging;
You are not those who saw the harbour
Receding, or those who will disembark.
Here between the hither and the farther shore
While time is withdrawn, consider the future
And the past with an equal mind.
And the moment which is not of action or inaction
You can receive this: “On whatever sphere of being
The mind of a man may be intent
At the time of death”─that is the one action
(And the time of death is every moment)
Which shall fructify in the lives of others:
And do not think of action
Fare forward.
                      O voyagers, O seamen,
You who come to port, and you whose bodies
Will suffer the trial and judgment of the sea,
Or whatever event, this is your real destination’
So Krishna, as when he admonished Arjuna
On the field of battle.
                       Not fare well,
But fare forward, voyagers.

출처 5: T.S. Eliot, The Complete Poems and Plays of T.S. Eliot. Faber & Faber, 2011

III

    I sometimes wonder if that is what Krishna meant─
    Among other things─or one way of putting the same thing:
    That the future is a faded song, a Royal Rose or a lavender spray
    Of wistful regret for those who are not yet here to regret,
    Pressed between yellow leaves of a book that has never been opened.
    And the way up is the way down, the way forward is the way back.
    You cannot face it steadily, but this thing is sure,
    That time is no healer: the patient is no longer here.
    When the train starts, and the passengers are settleed
    To fruit, periodicals and business letters
    (And those who saw them off have left the platform)
    Their faces relax from grief into relief,
    To the sleepy rhythm of a hundred hours.
    Fare forward, travellers! not escaping from the past
    Into different lives, or into any future;
    You are not the same people who left the station
    Or who will arrive at any terminus,
    While narrowing rails slide together behind you;
    And on the deck of the drumming liner
    Watching the furrow that widens behind you,
    You shall not think 'the past is finished'
    Or 'the future is before us'.
    At nightfall, in the rigging and the aerial,
    Is a voice descanting (though not to the ear,
    The murmuring shell of time, and not in any language)
    ‘Fare forward, you who think that you are voyaging;
    You are not those who saw the harbour
    Receding, or those who will disembark.
    Here between the hither and the farther shore
    While time is withdrawn, consider the future
    And the past with an equal mind.
    And the moment which is not of action or inaction
    You can receive this: “On whatever sphere of being
    The mind of a man may be intent
    At the time of death”─that is the one action
    (And the time of death is every moment)
    Which shall fructify in the lives of others:
    And do not think of action
    Fare forward.
                          O voyagers, O seamen,
    You who come to port, and you whose bodies
    Will suffer the trial and judgment of the sea,
    Or whatever event, this is your real destination’
    So Krishna, as when he admonished Arjuna
    On the field of battle.
                           Not fare well,
    But fare forward, voyagers.

[발췌] 헤라클레이토스의 공간 원리와 엘리엇의 <네 사중주>

출처: 헤라클레이토스의 공간 원리와 엘리엇의 <네 사중주> (이철희 지음. 현대영어영문학. 58권 3호. 2014년 8월. 171-88.



※ 발췌:

( ... ... ) 이 글은 <네 사중주Four Quartet>를 감상하기 위한 첫 단계로서 엘리엇이 정의한 시간 개념에 초점을 맞추어 보았다. 특히 엘리엇의 시간 논리를 이해하기 위해서는 헤라클레이토스의 공간 내에서의 사물의 이동 원리에 대한 이해가 필수라고 할 수 있다. ( ... ... )


II. 헤라클레이토스의 공간 원리

엘리엇은 <네 사중주>의 제사로서 헤라클레이토스가 주장한 우주 만물의 이동 원리를 사용한다. ( ... ... ) 그 제사의 내용은 다음과 가다.

ⓐ로고스가 공통적인 것임에도 불구하고 대부분의 사람들은 마치 자신이 지혜를 가진 것처럼 생활한다.

Although the Word (Logos) is common to all, most people live as if each of them had a private intelligence of his own.

ⓑ올라가는 길과 내려가는 길은 하나이고 동일하다.

The way up and the way down are one and the same. (Quinn 14)


( ... ... ) 우선 첫 번째 제사는 "개인은 로고스와의 조화 또는 종속 관계"(Williamson 209)를 의미하는 것으로서 인간 개개인은 로고스에 종속되는 관계라고 볼 수 있다. ( ... ) 그리고 두 번째 제사는 "헤라클레이토스의 영고성쇠의 교리를 나타내는 말로써"(이종철 207) 주의 깊게 관찰하지 않으면 매우 불합리하고 비논리적인 주장으로 곡해할 수도 있을 것이다. ( ... ... ) 헤라클레이토스에게 로고스는 다음과 같다.

그가(헤라클레이토소) 말하려고 한 핵심 관념은 로고스 관념이다. 모든 사물이 그것에 따라 조직되고 또한 여러 가지 모습으로--전쟁, 투쟁, 불신 등으로--자신을 드러내는 바의 그것이 바로 로고스이다. (햄린 19)

( ... ) [이것을] 엘리엇의 <네 사중주>의 제1 악장인 <번트 노턴(Burnt Norton)>에 적용해 보면 흥미로운 결과를 도출해 낼 수 있다. ( ... ... ) 그러므로 로고스를 중심으로 설정하고 사물의 이동 방향을 주시하면 올라가는 기리나 내려가는 길이나 동일한 것은 당연하다. 그래서 "기독교 시각에서 로고스를 말씀 혹은 회전하는 세계의 중심에 위치한 정점"(기쉬 171)으로 간주하는 것 또한 당연하다. ( ... ) 제1 악장인 <번트 노턴>은 제2 악장인 <이스트 코우커>, 제3 악장 <드라이 셀비지즈>와 제4 악장 <리틀 기딩>에 이르기까지 전체 4악장이 제1 악장의 제사로 압축되어 있다고 볼 수 있다. ( ... )

( ... ) 이와 같은 헤라클레이토스의 우주 만물의 이동 원리[는] ( ... ) 구심점을 중심으로 여러 개의 원형 추들이 상하, 좌우로 이동하는 원리라고 볼 수 있다. 원추들이 좌우로 이동한다고 하더라도 위에 위치한 구심점은 전혀 움직이지 않는다고 보면 될 것이다.[주]3  상부의 중심축을 로고스라고 정의할 수 있으며 하부에 위치한 원형 추들은 우주 만물을 상징한다고 보면 될 것이다. 상부의 구심점은 아무런 움직임이나 변함이 없고 늘 그 자리에 고정되어 잇는데, 엘리엇은 이것을 로고스라고 명명한 것이다. ( ... ) 결국 두 제사의 의미[를] 요약하면, "헤라클레이토스는 만물을 생성시키고 변화시키는 원동력을 모순과 대립으로 보았으며 그 모순과 대립 속에서도 조화를 이루게 하는 원동력이 바로 로고스"(박영식 33)라고 정의한다. 결국 세상의 만물들은 생성과 변화를 보이는 반면에 영원히 변함없는 존재는 로고스 밖에 없다. 특이한 점은 여기서 "엘리엇이 주로 관심을 두고 있는 것은 끊임없는 변화라기보다는 변화 속에 존재하는 질서"(Gish 97)라는 것이다. 즉 엘리엇은 ( ... ) 변화 속에서도 질서를 유지하는 모습에 관심을 가졌다고 볼 수 있다. 불가피한 변화 속에서도 필연적으로 항상성을 보이는 것이 존재한다는 것인데, 이 기제가 바로 로고스라는 것이다. ( ... )


III 공간 원리 적용의 실재

( ... ) 흥미로운 점은 헤라클레이토스의 우주 운행 원리를 엘리엇에게 적용하면 현재와 과거는 모두 미래에 존재한다는 사실을 알 수 있다.

현재의 시간과 과거의 시간은
아마 모두 미래의 시간에 존재하고
미래의 시간은 과거의 시간에 포함된다.
모든 시간이 영원히 현존한다면
모든 시간은 되찾을 수 없는 것이다.

Time present and time past
Are both perhaps present in time future
And time future contained in time past,
If all time is eternally present
All time is unredeemable.


( ... ... ) 이와 같이 "엘리엇은 <네 사중주>의 도입부를 시간과 구원의 가능성과 불가능성에 대한 명상으로 시작한다"(Rics 238). 다시 말해, "엘리엇은 <네 사중주>에서 시간의 안과 밖 그리고 인간과 하나님 사이의 합일점에 가장 관심을 두었으며"(Tamplin 154) 또한 "시간은 지속적으로 흘러가지만 로고스 안에서만은 영원하다"(Smith 256)는 전제를 설정하여 시간과 로고스와의 관계를 보여주기도 한다. ( ... ) 특히 <번트 노턴>은 종교적 언어와 이미져리에 의존해서 시간 밖에 존재하는 절대적 가치에 대한 생각이나 관념을 창조하려고 시도한다"(Scofield 197). 종교적 관점에서 보면 하나님의 말씀은 시공간을 초월하여 존재하기 때문에 모든 시간이 영원히 존재한다면 모든 시간은 되찾을 수 없는 논리가 되는 것이다. 다시 말해 "그리스도의 육화를 지속적으로 변하는 것과 영원한 것 사이의 합일을 최상으로 간주하듯" 엘리엇에게 하나님고의 친교의 순간이란 ( ... ) 지속적으로 이어진 시간임을 역설적으로 이야기하는 것이다. ( ... ... ) 그러나 엘리엇의 시간은 형이상학적으로 묘사되고 있으므로 그 모습을 육안으로는 볼 수 없는 것이 그 특징이라 할 수 있다. 그래서 "사색의 세계"가 펼쳐지게 된다.

있을 수 있었던 일은 하나의 추상으로
다만 사색의 세계에서만
영원한 가능성으로 남는 것이다.

What might have been is an abstraction
Remaining a perpetual possibility
Onl in a world of speculation.

위와 같은 정의를 통해서 우리는 가상의 세계(미래)란 단지 영원한 가능성 속에서만 존재하며[,] 하나의 추상이란 미래가 단순히 어느 한 시점에서 종결되지 않는다[는 것을 뜻한다??]는 사실을 알 수 있다. 그렇기 때문에 영원한 가능성 속에서만 그 가상의 세계가 남아 있게 되는 것이다. 그래서 엘리엇은 이 간단한 시간의 원리를 다음과 같이 요약한다.

있을 수 있었던 일과 있은 일은
한 점을 향하고, 그 점은 항상 현존한다.

What might have been and what has been
Point to one end, which is always present.

즉, "있을 수 있었던 것과 있었던 것은 추상적 사변이라기보다는 경험에 의해서 나온 감각"(Moody 144)이라는 점에서 시간은 경험과 밀접한 관계가 있다. 과거에 있엇던 것은 정확하게 미래를 의미하는 한 끝을 향하게 된다. 과거/현재/미래는 한 끝을 향하며 동시에 "항상 현존하여" 현재와 연결된다는 사실을 알 수 있다. ( ... ... )

( ... ... ) 헤라이클레이토스의 세계관을 엘리엇은 <이스트 코우커>에서 그대로 보여주고 있다.

나의 시작에 나의 끝이 있다. 연달아서
집들은 서고, 쓰러지고, 허물어지고, 넓혀지고,
옮겨지고, 파괴되고, 복구되고, 또는 그 자리에
넓은 논밭이나 공장이나 도로가 있다.
낡은 돌이 새 건물에, 낡은 목재는 새 부레,
낡은 불은 재로, 재는 흙으로,
흙은 이미 살이고, 모피ㅣ고, 배설물이고,
사람과 짐승의 뼈이고, 곡식 대이고 잎이다.
집들은 살다 죽는다. 세우는 시간이 있고,
사는 시간, 생산하는 시간이 있다.
또는 바람이 흔들리는 유리창을 깨뜨리는 시간,
들쥐가 달음질치는 벽 판장을 흔드는 시간, 그리고
무언의 표어를 짜 넣은 해진 에라스 천 벽결이를 흔드는 시간이 있다.

In my beginning is my end. In succession
Houses rise and fall, crumble, are extended,
Are removed, destroyed, restored, or in their place
Is an open field, or a factory, or a by-pass,
Old stone to new building, old timber to new fires,
Old fires to ashes, and ashes to the earth
Which is already flesh, fur and faeces,
Bone of man and beast, cornstalk and leaf,
Houses live and die; there is a time for building
And a time for living and for generation
And a time for the wind to brek the loosened pane
And to shake the wainscot where the field-mouse trots
And to shake the tattered arras woven with a silent motto.

엘리엇은 위와 같이 헤라이클레이토스가 규정한 우주 만물의 "항변(성)"을 그대로 보여주고 있다. 즉, 이미 시작은 끝을 향한 새로운 출발이 될 수 있으며 이것은 바로 생물의 탄생은 곧 죽음을 향해 시간 위를 질주하는 모습에 견줄 수 있다. 그러면서 엘리엇은 바로 그 항면의 모습을 여러 가지 상황으로 설명한다. (1) 연달아서 집들이 서고 쓰러지고 허물어지고 넓혀지고 옮겨지고, 파괴되고, 복구되고, (2) 그런데 그 자리에 다시 넓은 논밭이나 공장이나 도로가 생기며, (3) 낡은 돌은 새 건물에 사용되고, (4) 낡은 재목은 새 불에 사용되기, (5) 낡은 불은 재로 옮겨서 다시 사용되고 다시 재는 흙으로 돌아가는 것 등 시공간적으로 열 가지의 변화와 변전을 겪는다는 것이다. 그러면서 이 열 가지를 변화와 변전의 종결부로 맺고 다시 이어지는 연을 "나의 시작에 나의 끝이 있다"는 재단정의 진술로 이어진다. 이는 바로 시작이라는 시간은 이미 끝을 향한 것이고 끝은 다시 시작으로 회귀할 수 있는 가능성을 내포한다고 볼 수 있다. ( ... ... )

( ... ... )

우리의 유일한 건강은 병이다.
죽어가는 간호사에 복종하면
그의 끊임없는 간호는 우리를 즐겁게 하는 것이 아니고
우리에게 우리의 그리고, 아담의 저주를 상기시키는 것이다.
그러니 회복하자면 우리의 병은 점점 악화되어야 한다.

온 지상은 우리의 병원이다.
파멸한 갑부가 물려준
그 속에서 우리의 건강이 튼튼하자면
우리는 우리를 버리지 않고, 도처에서 우리를 보호하는
절대적인 아버지의 간호로써 죽어야 할 것이다.

Our only health is the disease
If we obey the dying nurse
Whose constant care is not to please
But to remind of our, and Adam's curse,
And that, to be restored, our sickness must grow worse.

The whole earth is our hospital
Endowed bythe ruined millionaire,
Wherein, if we do well, we shall
Die of the absolute paternal care
That will not leave us, but prevents us everywhere.

( ... ... )

회전하는 세계의 정지하는 일점에, 육도 비육도 아닌
그곳으로부터도 아니고 그곳을 향하여서도 아닌, 정지점 거기에 춤이 있다.
정지도 운동도 아니다. 고정이라고 불러선 안 된다.
과거와 미래가 합치는 점이다. 그 곳으로부터 또는 그 곳을 향한 운동도 아니고,
상승도 하강도 아니다. 이 점, 이 정지점 없이는
춤은 없다. 거기에만 춤이 있다.

At the still point of the turning world. Neither flesh nor fleshless;
Neither from nor towards; at the still point, there the dance is,
But neither arrest nor movement. And we do not call it fixity,
Where past and future are gathered. Neither movement from nor towards,
Neither ascent nor decline. Except for the point, the still point,
There would be no dance, and there is only the dance.

( ... ... )

패턴의 세부는 운동이다.
열 개의 계단의 비유에서처럼.
욕망 자체는 동이고
그 자체는 좋지 못하다.
사랑은 그 자체가 비동이고
다만 동의 원인이고 궁극일 뿐,
초시간이고, 비 욕망,
시간의 양상이 아닌
비존재와 존재 사이의
영역의 형태로 파악된다.

The detail of the pattern is movement,
As in the figure of the ten stairs.
Desire itself is movement
Not in itself desireable;
Love is itself unmoving,
Only the cause and end of movement,
Timeless, and undesiring
Except in the aspect of time
Caught in the form of limitation
Between un-being and being.

( ... ... ) 이와 같은 논리로 추론해 볼 때 엘리엇은 <네 사중주>를 헤라이클레이토스의 우주 공간 속에서의 사물의 이동 원리를 바탕으로 창작했음이 분명함을 알 수 있다.

IV. 나오며

( ... ... )

[발췌: 누스바움] "Aeschylus and practical conflict"

출처: Martha Nussbaum. The Fragility of Goodness: Luck and Ethics in Greek Tragedy and Philosophy. Cambridge University Press, 2001. 구글도서.


※ 발췌 (excerpt):

Chapter 2
Aeschylus and practical conflict

Greek tragedy shows good people being ruined because of thing that just happen to them, thing that they do not control. This is certainly said; but it is an ordinary fact of human life, and no one would deny that it happens. Nor does it threaten any of our deeply held beliefs about goodness, since goodness, plainly, can persist unscathed through a change in external fortunes. Tragedy also, however, shows something more deeply disturbing: it shows good people doing bad things, things otherwise repugnant to their ethical character and commitments, because of circumstances whose origin does not lie with them. Some such cases are mitigated by the presence of direct physical constraint or excusable ignorance. In those cases we may feel satisfied that the agents has not actually ^acted^ badly--either because he or she has not ^acted^ at all, or because (as in the case of Oedipus) the thing he intentionally ^did^ was not the same as the bad thing that he inadvertently brought about. But the tragedies also shows us, and dwell upon, another more intractable sort of case--one which has come to be called, as a result, the situation of 'tragic conflict'. In such a case we see a wrong action committed without any direct physical compulsion and in full knowledge of its nature, by a person whose ethical character or commitments would otherwise dispose him to reject the act. The constraints come from the presence of circumstances that prevent the adequate fulfillment of two valid ethical claims. Tragedy tends, on the whole, to take such situations very seriously. It treats them as real cases of wrong-doing that are of relevance for an assessment of the agent's ethical life. Tragedy also seems to think it valuable to dwell upon these situations, exploring them in many ways, asking repeatedly what personal goodness, in such alarming complication, is.

For this attitude Greek tragedy, and especially Aeschylean tragegy, has been repeatedly assailed as morally primitive. ( ... ... )


I

We are considering situations, then, in which a person must choose to do (have) either one thing or another. Because of the way the world has arranged things, he or she cannot do (have) both. (We suspend, termporarily, the question whether by better planning he might have avoided the dilemma altogether. This question will be the subject of our next chapter.) ( ... ... )


III

At the beginning of Aeschylus's ^Agamemnon^, there is a strange and ominous portent. The king of birds appear to the kings of the ships. Two eagles,one black, one white-tailed, in full view of the army, devour a pregnant hare with all her unborn young. It is difficult not to connect this omen with the coming slaughter, by this army, of innocent citizens at Troy. It is also difficult for an audience familiar with this story not to connect it with the imminent slaughter of the helpless girl Iphigenia, which will prove necessary for the departure of the expedition. But the omen receives from the prophet Calchas an oddly trivial interpretation. He 'knows the warlike devourers of the hare for the conducting chiefs'; and yet he predicts only that the army, in laying siege to Troy, will slaughter many herd of cattle before its walls. ( ... ... )

Agamemnon is told by the prophet that if he does not offer up his daughter as a sacrifice, the entire expedition will remain becalmed. Already men are starving, and winds blowing from the Strymon, 'were wearing and wasting away the flower of the Argives'. If Agamemnon does not fulfil Artemis's conditin, everyone, including Iphigenia, will die. He will also be abandoning the expedition and, therefore, violating the command of Zeus. He will be a ^deserter^. It may, furthermore, depending upon our understanding of Artemis's requirements, be an act of disobedience against her. To perform the sacrifice will be, however, to perform a horrible and guilty act. We can see that one choice, the choice to sacrifice Iphigenia, seems clearly preferable, both because of consequences and because of the impiety involved in the other choice. ( ... ... )

Agamemnon is allowed to choose: that is to day, he knows what he is doing; he is neither ignorant of the situation nor physically compelled; nothing forces him to choose one course rather than the other. ( ... ... ) The special agony of this situation is that none of the possibilities is even harmless.

Agamemnon's first response is anger and grief: 'The Atreidae beat the ground with their staffs, and could not keep back their tears'. He then describes his predicament, apparently with full recognition of both competing claims. He acknowledges that there is wrong done whichever way he chooses:

A heavy doom is disobedience, but heavy, too, if I shall rend my own child, the adornment of my house, polluting a father's hands with streams of slaughtered maiden's blood close by the altar. Which of these is without evils? How should I become a deserter, failing in my duty to the alliance?

Agamemnon's statement of the alternatives shows us his sense that the ^better^ choice in the situation is the sacrifice: the future indicative in 'if I shall rend my own child' is not parallel to the weak deliberative subjuctive of 'How should I become a deserter?' But he indicates, too, that both choices involve evil.

( ... ... )


CF. The Costs of Tragedy: Some Moral Limits of Cost-Benefit Analysis (Martha Nussbaum, The Journal of Legal Studies, Vol. 29, No. 2, June 2000