Journal archive

Abstract: This paper presents the results of a comparative study of the collection of poems Old Possum’s Book of Practical Cats (1939) by T. S. Eliot and the collection of children’s verses Mother Goose Old Nursery Rhymes (published in 1760), compiled and illustrated by A. Rackham (1913). Consisting of 15 poems, and distinguished by its frivolity against the background of other works by Eliot, the cycle Old Possum’s Book of Practical Cats has been overlooked by both Russian and foreign researchers for a long time. Recently a surge of interest in this book of verse has been provoked by the release of a feature film Cats (2019) based on the world-famous musical by Andrew Lloyd Webber. This fact as well as the lack of serious academic studies of Eliot’s book of verse has determined the urgency and novelty of this paper. It is also important to show the involvement of this segment of Eliot’s poetry into the English literary tradition. The aim of this research is to identify the influence of Victorian aesthetics of nonsense on the poetry of T. S. Eliot’s cycle. The method of comparative analysis has been chosen as the main research method. Besides, structural-semantic and linguistic-cultural methods have been used. In understanding and interpreting the term “tradition” the author relies on Eliot’s aesthetics, in which this concept is central. The terminological unit “nursery rhymes” is used in its original traditional meaning since its historical and cultural background disappears in any Russian translation or scholarly interpretation. In the course of work, certain features of nur- sery rhymes have been identified in the poetic texts by the great Modernist. The study of the specificity of this genre (the playful atmosphere of the text, the special rhythms and forms of coding historical events, animalistic perspectives, the use of various repetitions and imitations, the creation of author’s occasionalisms and unusual names of characters, etc.) confirms strong influence of the tradition of English nursery rhymes on T. S. Eliot’s works.

About the author(s) :

Kristina M. Marshaniya

Tyumen State University (Tyumen, Russia)

ORCID ID: https://orcid.org/0000-0003-0218-0079

Publication Timeline:

Date of receipt: 27.04.2021; date of publication: 30.06.2021.

References:

Burton-Hill, Cl. (2015). The Dark Side of Nursery Rhymes. URL: https://www.bbc.com/culture/article/20150610-thedark-side-of-nursery-rhymes (mode of access: 14.12.2020).
Darnton, R. (1984). The Great Cat Massacre and Other Episodes in French Cultural History. New York, Basic Books. 298 p.
Eliot, T. S. (1925). Poems 1909–1925. London, Faber & Gwyer. 99 p.
Eliot, T. S. (1999). Kniga o kotakh [The Book about Cats] / transl. by V. Betaki. Moscow, Zaharov. 80 p.
Eliot, T. S. (1999). Tradition and Individual Talent. In The Egoist. Vol. VI. No. 4, September, December, pp. 54–55,
72–73.
Eliot, T. S. (2012). Prakticheskoe kotovedenie [Practical Cat Science] // transl. by S. G. Dubovickaya. Saint Petersburg,
Moscow, Letnii sad. 96 p.
Eliot, T. S. (2013). Populyarnaya nauka o koshkakh, napisannaya Starym Opossumom [Old Possum’s Book of Practical Cats]. In Eliot, T. S. Stikhotvoreniya i poemy / transl. by V. Toporov, A. Sergeev, Yu. Rac. Moscow, AST. 605 p.
Elwes, K. (1930). Real Personages of Mother Goose. Lothrop, Lee & Shepard Co. 360 p.
Encyclopaedia Britannica. URL: https://www.britannica.com/art/limerick-poetic-form (mode of access: 15.03.2021).
Fox, A. (2000). Oral and Literature Culture in England, 1500–1700. Oxford University Press. 202 p.
Khornbi, A. S. (1982). Tolkovyi slovar’ sovremennogo angliiskogo yazyka dlya prodvinutogo etapa: Spetsial’noe izdanie dlya
SSSR [Explanatory Dictionary of Contemporary English for Advanced Level: Special Edition for the USSR]. Vol. II M–Z.
Moscow, Russkii yazyk, Oksford yuniversiti press. 528 p.
Klyuev, E. V. (2000). Teoriya literatury absurda [The Theory of Nonsense Literature]. Moscow, Izdatel’stvo URAO. 192 p.
Kulshreshtha, Ch. (2017). Nursery Rhymes: A Linkage Between Society and Culture. In IJELLH. Vol. V. Issue IX, September, pp. 13–22.
Marshak, S. Ya., Marshak, A. I. (2014). Kogda ya stanu korolem. Angliiskie detskie pesenki [When I Become a King. English Nursery Rhymes]. Moscow, AST. 178 p.
Marshak, S. Ya., Marshak, A. I. (2017). Stikhi i pesenki Matushki Gusyni [Verses and Songs of Mother Goose]. Moscow, Rosmen-Press. 128 p.
Polovinkina, O. I. (2011). Nekto Grishkina iz stikhotvoreniya T. S. Eliota: poeticheskoe vpechatlenie o «Russkikh sezonakh» [Someone Grishkin from a Poem by T. S. Eliot: a Poetic Impression of “Russian Seasons”]. In Problemy sovremennoi komparativistiki. Moscow, Zhurnal «Voprosy literatury», pp. 230–241.
Rackham, A. (1994). Mother Goose Old Nursery Rhymes. Wordsworth Editions Limited. 126 p.
Ricks, Ch., McCue, J. (2015). The Poems of T. S. Eliot. Volume II. Practical Cats and Further Verses. London, Faber and
Faber. 667 p.
Sewell, E. (1983). Lewis Carroll and T. S. Eliot as Nonsense Poets. In Eliot, T. S. A Collection of Critical Essays / ed. by K. Hugh, Cl. Englewood. N.J., pp. 65–72.

Thiébaut, E. Talking Animals and Talking Cats in The Old Possum’s Book of Practical Cats and Its Musical Adaptation. URL:
https://www.academia.edu/41829495/Talking_animals_and_talking_cats_in_The_Old_Possums_Book_of_Practical_Cats_and_its_musical_adaptation (mode of access: 15.12.2020).
Ushakova, O. M. (2005). T. S. Eliot i evropeiskaya kul’turnaya traditsiya [T. S. Eliot and European Cultural Tradition]. Tyumen, Izdatel’stvo Tyumenskogo gosudarstvennogo universiteta. 220 p