Delighted to have been provoked into presenting at this unique symposium by Timothy Stacey who, with Panagiotis Pentaris (both PhD candidates at Goldsmiths) organises this annual event.
It's a pleasure to be able to discuss, in a serious setting, the phenomenon of spirituality today in dramatic texts. I'm actually looking at the societal impact of T.S. Eliot's Murder in the Cathedral and it's capacity to involve (ensnare?) an audience in its powerful theatre.
My talk is called 'A rain of blood has blinded my eyes: T.S. Eliot's Murder in the Cathedral as a discourse on World War Two'. A provocative title maybe but this play has had a history of provoking academics and audiences into ongoing and multiple interpretations.
It's much more playful than the whodunnit title suggests and every bit as gripping. I will be examining the kind of spirituality evoked in the text with reference to Elisabeth Däumer's remarkable account of the play's reception in postwar Germany and discussing how the spiritual component in the play contributes to any discourse we have on the war and its aftermath.
