What Is A Classic

‘What is a Classic?
’
1944
Excerpts from
‘What is a Classic?’
T. S. Eliot, On Poetry and Poets (London, 1957)
If there is one word on which we can fix, which will suggest the maximum of what I
mean by the term ‘a classic’, it is the word maturity. I shall distinguish between the
universal classic, like Virgil, and the classic which is only such in relation to the other
literature in its own language, or according to the view of life of a particular period. A
classic can only occur when a civilization is mature; when a language and a literature
are mature; and it must be the work of a mature mind. It is the importance of that
civilization and of that language, as well as the comprehensiveness of the mind of the
individual poet, which gives the universality.
(pp. 54-55)
… it is interesting to speculate whether, if Marlowe had lived as long as Shakespeare,

his development would have continued at the same pace. I doubt it: for we observe
some minds maturing earlier than others, and we observe that those which mature
very early do not always develop very far. I raise this point as a reminder, first that the
value of maturity depends upon the value of that which matures, and second, that we
should know when we are concerned with the maturity of individual writers, and
when with the relative maturity of literary periods. A writer who individually has a
more mature mind may belong to a less mature period than another, so that in that
respect his work will be less mature. The maturity of a literature is the reflection of
that of the society in which it is produced: an individual author – notably Shakespeare
and Virgil – can do much to develop his language: but he cannot bring that language
to maturity unless the work of his predecessors has prepared it for his final touch.
(p. 55)
We cannot say that any individual poet in English has in the course of his life become
a more mature man than Shakespeare: we cannot even say that any poet has done so
much, to make the English language capable of expressing the most subtle thought or
the most refined shades of feeling. Yet we cannot but feel that a play like
Congreve’s Way of the World is in some way more mature than any play of
Shakespeare’s: but only in this respect, that it reflects a more mature society – that is,
it reflects a greater maturity of manners. … So to maturity of mind we must add
maturity of manners.
(p. 56)
You will have anticipated the conclusion towards which I have been drawing: that
those qualities of the classic which I have so far mentioned – maturity of mind,
maturity of manners, maturity of language and perfection of the common style – are
most nearly to be illustrated, in English literature, in the eighteenth century; and, in
poetry, most in the poetry of Pope.
(p. 59)
When one thinks of a Shakespeare, a Jeremy Taylor, a Milton, in England – of a

Racine, a Molière, a Pascal, in France – in the seventeenth century, one is inclined to
say that the eighteenth century had perfected its formal garden, only by restricting the
area under cultivation.
(p. 60)
Maturity of mind: this needs history, and the consciousness of history. Consciousness
of history cannot be fully awake, except where there is other history than the history
than the history of the poet’s own people: we need this in order to see our own place
in history.
(p. 61)
I think that we are conscious, in Virgil more than in any other Latin poet – for
Catullus and Propertius seem ruffians, and Horace somewhat plebeian, by comparison
– of a refinement of manner, springing from a delicate sensibility, and particularly in
that test of manners, private and public conduct between the sexes. … I have always
thought the meeting of Aeneas with the shade of Dido, in Book VI, not only one of
the most poignant, but one of the most civilized passages in poetry. It is complex in
meaning and economical in expression, for it not only tells us about the attitude of
Dido – still more important is what it tells us about the attitude of Aeneas. Dido’s
behaviour appears almost as a projection of Aeneas’ own conscience: this, we feel, is
the way in which Aeneas’ conscience would expect Dido to behave to him. The point,
it seems to me, is not that Dido is unforgiving – though it is important that, instead of
railing at him, she merely snubs him – perhaps the most telling snub in all poetry:
what matters most is, that Aeneas does not forgive himself – and this, significantly, in
spite of the fact of which he is well aware, that all that he has done has been in
compliance with destiny, or in consequence of the machinations of the gods who are
themselves, we feel, only instruments of a greater inscrutable power.
(p. 63)
We must accordingly add, to our list of characteristics of the classic, that
of comprehensiveness. The classic must, within its formal limitations, express the
maximum possible of the whole range of feeling which represents the character of the
people who speak that language. It will represent this at its best, and it will also have
the widest appeal: among the people to which it belongs, it will find its response
among all classes and conditions of men.
(p. 67)
The bloodstream of European literature is Latin and Greek – not as two systems of
circulation, but one, for it is through Rome that our parentage in Greece must be
traced. What common measure of excellence have we in literature, among our several
languages, which is not the classical measure? What mutual intelligibility can we
hope to preserve, except in our common heritage of thought and feeling in those two
languages, for the understanding of which, no European people is in any position of
advantage over any other? No modern language could aspire to the universality of
Latin, even though it came to be spoken by millions more than ever spoke Latin, and
even though it came to be the universal means of communication between people of
all tongues and cultures. No modern language can hope to produce a classic, in the
sense in which I have called Virgil a classic. Our classic, the classic of all Europe, is
Virgil.
(p. 70)
So we may think of Roman literature: at first sight, a literature of limited scope, with a
poor muster of great names, yet universal as no other literature can be; a literature
unconsciously sacrificing, in compliance to its destiny in Europe, the opulence and
variety of later tongues, to produce, for us, the classic. It is sufficient that this standard
should have been established once and for all; the task does not have to be done again.
But the maintenance of the standard is the price of our freedom, the defence of
freedom against chaos. We may remind ourselves of this obligation, by our annual
observance of piety towards the great ghost who guided Dante’s pilgrimage: who, as it
was his function to lead Dante towards a vision he could never himself enjoy, led
Europe towards the Christian culture which he could never know …

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‘What is a Classic?

… it is interesting to speculate whether, if Marlowe had lived as long as Shakespeare,

When one thinks of a Shakespeare, a Jeremy Taylor, a Milton, in England – of a

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