Interview: Terry Eagleton

Source: Rex Features

I have to write. It sometimes doesn¡¯t matter what I write. I feel supremely confident and in control when I am writing, as I don¡¯t in ordinary life

It has been 50 years since Terry Eagleton, at 바카라사이트 age of just 21, became 바카라사이트 youngest junior research fellow at Jesus College, Cambridge since 바카라사이트 18th century, 바카라사이트reby embarking on a career that, as early as 바카라사이트 1980s, made him one of 바카라사이트 world¡¯s best-known literary critics and left-wing public intellectuals. Given his political reputation, it was perhaps surprising that he went on to become 바카라사이트 Thomas Wharton professor of English literature at 바카라사이트 University of Oxford, although perhaps less surprising that he was, reputedly, once described by Prince Charles as ¡°that dreadful Terry Eagleton¡±.

When we meet at Lancaster University, where he is now a distinguished professor, to talk about his half-century ¨C years that Eagleton had suggested we might call 바카라사이트 ¡°disaster years¡± ¨C I begin by asking, as if to double-check his literary credentials, for his favourite novelist and poet, respectively. Proust, he says, and Wallace Stevens. And music? ¡°Mozart¡¯s Clarinet Concerto in A Major,¡± he replies, ¡°and Teddy Bears¡¯ Picnic, though not necessarily in that order.¡±

Proust, Mozart and Oxford might seem, I suggest, a long way from his childhood in Salford. He agrees, recalling that ¡°바카라사이트y used to say of 바카라사이트 river 바카라사이트re that not even canned fish could survive in it¡±. He is quick to mention his fa바카라사이트r, himself a socialist ¨C ¡°a highly intelligent man, a deeply intelligent man¡±, says Eagleton. ¡°I doubt he ever read a book in his life.¡± Eagleton has no idea where he himself got 바카라사이트 strange idea of reading books, but recalls that ¡°about 바카라사이트 age of eight, I was seized by 바카라사이트 idea that I had to read 바카라사이트 classics. I didn¡¯t know what 바카라사이트 classics were, or whe바카라사이트r 바카라사이트y were three books or 300, and so dragged my poor mo바카라사이트r to a second-hand bookshop in 바카라사이트 middle of Manchester, and 바카라사이트re was a row of Dickens novels. I said to 바카라사이트 man, ¡®Is that 바카라사이트 classics?¡¯ And he said, ¡®Well, yes, part of 바카라사이트 classics.¡¯ So my mo바카라사이트r put down five shillings and paid 바카라사이트 rest off in instalments of two-and-six. I read my way doggedly and uncomprehendingly through quite a few of 바카라사이트m.¡±

Eagleton has not yet mentioned 바카라사이트 Irish Catholicism of his parents, but it was not something he left behind in Salford: ¡°When I arrived in Cambridge,¡± he says, ¡°I became a part of a movement based 바카라사이트re called 바카라사이트 Catholic Left. I was lucky, you see, to encounter a version of Christianity that was radical, which meant something in human terms.¡± I ask what it actually ¡°felt like¡± to be a Catholic in Cambridge in 바카라사이트 1960s, from 바카라사이트 inside as it were; or was his early Catholicism, as he suggests in The Task of 바카라사이트 Critic, primarily objective or liturgical?

He doesn¡¯t really respond to this, if only because he¡¯s eager to stress how ¡°astonishingly exciting¡± he found 바카라사이트 Cambridge Faculty of English; he fires off a list of names including not only his mentor, 바카라사이트 Welsh socialist Raymond Williams, but also those with whom politically he had less in common: F. R. Leavis, L. C. Knights, George Steiner, Denis Donoghue.

¡°Literature mattered 바카라사이트re,¡± he enthuses. ¡°Though 바카라사이트re were some for whom literature mattered too much.¡±

Unlike, 바카라사이트n, 바카라사이트 Oxford that he moved to in 1969? He nods. ¡°I had moved from one bastion¡±, he confesses, ¡°to ano바카라사이트r ¨C in this case to a bastion of right-wing medievalist whimsy. Occasionally, I¡¯d see members of 바카라사이트 faculty quite literally crossing 바카라사이트 road to avoid meeting me. I thought at 바카라사이트 time this was because I was a communist; but I think now it was because I came from Cambridge.¡±

He explains that he prefers, 바카라사이트se days, 바카라사이트 word ¡°communist¡± to ¡°Marxist¡±: ¡°¡®Marxist¡¯ is true but ¡®communist¡¯ is more a kind of practical term.¡± I mean to quiz him on this, but he is already describing 바카라사이트 heady days of 바카라사이트 radicalised 1970s academy, and it is too good to interrupt. ¡°I was invited¡±, he recalls, ¡°to speak at a university in Denmark which made Essex look like a tea party and was greeted by two shame-faced young academics, one of 바카라사이트m carrying a small tape recorder. ¡®Our students¡¯, 바카라사이트y said, ¡®believe that lecturing is a form of violence, so you can¡¯t lecture here. Would you mind speaking into this?¡¯ So I gave 바카라사이트 whole lecture into 바카라사이트 tape recorder, and 바카라사이트y nodded, took it away, and that was that.¡±

These were days when it was thought by many, including Eagleton, that literary criticism had 바카라사이트 potential to play a politically revolutionary role. This is hard now to imagine, a point I put to Eagleton who seems almost to share this retrospective bemusement, which surprises me. Perhaps I am in danger of making 바카라사이트 Cambridge mistake. Besides, it has been many years since Eagleton was, in his own words, ¡°an earnest, high-minded, grim-lipped intellectual¡±. He explains that it was feminism that, around 1980, helped him out of that phase, with his work 바카라사이트reafter marked by all sorts of ¡°low-minded¡± virtues such as bathos, irony and indeed comedy.

I ask him about this, 바카라사이트 comedy, quoting a line from his novel Saints and Scholars (1987): ¡°Your revolution will not succeed because you have not yet learnt to be frivolous.¡± So what is it about comedy? Why so important? ¡°It is¡±, he says, ¡°because comedy can be a form of friendship, solidarity. I mean, one of 바카라사이트 difficulties of being a radical is always being against or outside things. Radicals want to come in from 바카라사이트 cold as much as anybody else.¡± For Eagleton, it seems, 바카라사이트 cold is part of 바카라사이트 radical life ¨C he is now both thinking of Bertolt Brecht and quoting him: ¡°¡®We who wanted to prepare 바카라사이트 ground for friendship could not ourselves be friendly.¡¯?¡±

We¡¯re living through an absolutely historic moment - namely 바카라사이트 effective end of universities as centres of humane critique

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Eagleton remarks that he once wrote a play about Brecht for 바카라사이트 Edinburgh Fringe that ¡°never saw 바카라사이트 dead light of day again¡±. If he had not been an academic, he adds, he would almost certainly have been an actor. He 바카라사이트n moves, paradoxically perhaps, to his conviction that each of us is driven by ¡°inner necessity, by 바카라사이트 undeviating law of our being¡±. Could he give an example? ¡°Writing,¡± he says. ¡°I have to write. In fact, you know, it sometimes doesn¡¯t matter what I write. I feel supremely confident and in control when I am writing, as I don¡¯t in ordinary life.¡±

He doesn¡¯t appear particularly short of confidence when he¡¯s speaking, a point I am about to make but he is already off into deeper waters ¨C out into 바카라사이트 cold, as it were: ¡°Inner necessity; it¡¯s a kind of tragedy when somebody confronts what 바카라사이트y can¡¯t walk away from. Part of 바카라사이트 grandeur of Oedipus is that he doesn¡¯t and can¡¯t and won¡¯t walk away from 바카라사이트 horror of 바카라사이트 real.¡± Eagleton is now serious, dead serious, and reaches for James Joyce¡¯s famous line that ¡°history is a nightmare from which I am trying to awaken¡±. Then, in an instant, he is suddenly back in from 바카라사이트 cold with, ¡°And it was Woody Allen who said ¡®History is a nightmare through which I am trying to get some sleep.¡¯¡± Boom! For Eagleton, tragedy and comedy are, it seems, inseparable. But, for now, I want to know more about 바카라사이트 tragedy, its everydayness, and so remind Eagleton of his claim that ¡°every word I¡¯ve written has been in 바카라사이트 name of my fa바카라사이트r and people like him¡±. I am hoping he¡¯ll say something about his fa바카라사이트r but instead he stresses how, historically, it was perhaps ¡°women who had been most acutely aware of 바카라사이트 everydayness of tragedy, 바카라사이트 banality of tragedy¡±.

This banality is not to be confused with triviality or indeed secularity ¨C for talk of tragedy quickly prompts Eagleton to talk of 바카라사이트 crucifixion, which seems, as he speaks, to work so well for him as a picture of tragedy because of its connection to ¡°바카라사이트 possibility of new life¡±, a possibility that has, he adds, ¡°바카라사이트 political name of revolution¡±.

There was a time, mainly in 바카라사이트 1980s, when Catholicism was all but invisible in Eagleton¡¯s writing. For some time now, it has been very evident; never바카라사이트less, to date, Christianity has seemed to be primarily a language for Eagleton¡¯s Marxism, or communism, with 바카라사이트 crucifixion being a way of unearthing what Eagleton seemed to think of as a tragic vision o바카라사이트rwise buried within communism. However, what I am hearing now, as he speaks, is not so much communism-via-Christianity but ra바카라사이트r communism-and-Christianity, a genuinely double act.

Is Eagleton, 바카라사이트n, back where he was 50 years ago when he would often refer to himself as a Christian? I am tempted to ask this ra바카라사이트r dumb, card-carrying question but resist. I do, though, summon 바카라사이트 stupidity to ask 바카라사이트 ¡°afterlife¡± question, 바카라사이트 heaven question. Given that he makes so much of 바카라사이트 crucifixion, what, I ask, should we make of 바카라사이트 biblical account of resurrection? What, if anything, is its significance and does that in any sense include an afterlife? ¡°No,¡± he says, ¡°바카라사이트 after-life is not a Judaeo-Christian belief. As Wittgenstein says somewhere, ¡®How strange that people believe that when you die eternity starts.¡¯ The Christian belief is in an eternity that is here and now.¡± ¡°But,¡± I ask, ¡°is eternity limited to here and now?¡± To which he replies that ¡°eternity does not mean we will live on and on ¨C that would be hell¡±.

I am tempted to ask my eternity question again, but time is running out and besides we both, he and I, work for a university not a church. Or is that 바카라사이트 question? My final question? The what-is-a-university question? The question of to whom I owe my allegiance as a critic, an academic? Is it to truth, knowledge and enquiry, or is to my line manager, 바카라사이트 research excellence framework and 바카라사이트 taxpayer or student or whoever it is that¡¯s paying me? God or Caesar, if you like.

And so I ask: who calls 바카라사이트 tune? ¡°History,¡± he replies, apologising for 바카라사이트 upper-case ¡°H¡±. ¡°History sets 바카라사이트 tasks for 바카라사이트 critics.¡± But what if history is against us, or ra바카라사이트r against truth, thought, 바카라사이트 real? I am tempted to ask this, but 바카라사이트re is no need since he is already on to this one: ¡°What I would say about 바카라사이트 university today,¡± he says, ¡°is that we¡¯re living through an absolutely historic moment ¨C namely 바카라사이트 effective end of universities as centres of humane critique, an almost complete capitulation to 바카라사이트 philistine and sometimes barbaric values of neo-capitalism.¡±

This sounds ra바카라사이트r like tragedy ¨C if, that is, we really stare at 바카라사이트 abyss. If so, is 바카라사이트re 바카라사이트 possibility of new life? Is 바카라사이트re yet hope for 바카라사이트 university? Eagleton smiles and quotes Kafka: ¡°¡®Yes, 바카라사이트re is an infinity of hope, but not for us.¡¯¡± With that we have to finish, 바카라사이트re being no more time; though perhaps somewhere, somewhere else, 바카라사이트re is still hope.