John Farrell to perform T.S. Eliot’s ‘Four Quartets’ at Skidompha
John Farrell will recite T.S. Eliot’s “Four Quartets” from memory at Skidompha Sept. 28 and 29. Barry Dodd photo
John Farrell will recite T.S. Eliot’s “Four Quartets” from memory at Skidompha Sept. 28 and 29. Barry Dodd photo
Midcoast audiences have the extraordinary opportunity to experience John Farrell, a principal in Maine’s groundbreaking Figures of Speech Theatre, reciting T.S. Eliot’s suite of poems, “Four Quartets,”- considered to be Eliot’s greatest - from memory.
First premiered at Heartwood in 2011, with permission — rarely granted — from Eliot’s estate, Farrell’s recitation of “Four Quartets” affords audiences an opportunity to immerse themselves in 1,000 lines of poetry exploring humankind’s relationship with time and with experience, itself. The performance, part of Figures of Speech Theatre’s 2018 Maine Library Tour, is being co-presented by Heartwood Theater and Skidompha Library.
The library tour’s first stop was at Merrill Memorial Library in Yarmouth for a standing room-only audience. Mary Dowd, Curator of Poetry at the Library, wrote: “John Farrell was our bridge to the infinitely rich world of “Four Quartets,” in a milestone performance that surpassed what I expected, or could even imagine.”
Eliot completed Four Quartets in 1941, as Britain slid into the abyss of World War II, and he feared that civilization itself might perish in the coming years. Writing at the height of his artistic powers, Eliot packed into the suite of poems a summation of his views on poetry and art, on mystical experience, and on the never-ceasing search for the divine.
“Unlike encountering the poems in a book,” Farrell says, “hearing them recited out loud gives people a chance to absorb a complex and nuanced work in a very direct way. At the same time, I bring an actor's sensibility to the text and a commitment to delivering the poems in a way that allows the poetry to speak for itself.”
A stanza from “Burnt North” the first of the four quartets:
“ Time past and time future
Allow but a little consciousness.
To be conscious is not to be in time
Allow but a little consciousness.
To be conscious is not to be in time
But only in time can the moment in the rose-garden,
The moment in the arbour where the rain beat,
The moment in the draughty church at smokefall
Be remembered; involved with past and future.
Only through time time is conquered.”
Skidompha's atrium is the venue for this unique experience. The Library is at 184 Main Street in Damariscotta. Performances on Friday, Sept. 28 and Saturday, Sept. 29 are at 7:30 p.m. Tickets, $10, are available only at the door, opening at 7 p.m. An informal conversation with John Farrell will follow. For more on Figures of Speech Theater, visit www.figures.org.
For more info or questions, please contact Heartwood Theater, 563-1373 or info@heartwoodtheater.org.
Event Date
Address
184 Main Street
Damariscotta, ME 04543
United States
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