ABSTRACT
T. S. Eliot’s maternal melodrama The Family Reunion (1939) is an apex regarding his poetic effort to symbolise and understand the ambivalent mother. Through reference to Peter Brooks, Eric Bentley and Jan Campbell, the chapter looks at the efficacy of the melodramatic mode in staging and resolving ambivalence. This is a formative reason why Eliot turns toward poetic drama in his late career. Eliot’s choice of Aeschylus’ Oresteia as a model for The Family Reunion is due to it providing an alternative male solution to the Oedipus myth for the problem of the maternal body in the absence of paternal authority. The play’s mother figures, Agatha and Amy, are split representations of the ambivalent mother. Moreover, Eliot’s mother, Charlotte, is emphasised as a real influence on Eliot’s depiction of Amy and idealisation of Agatha. Julia Kristeva’s notion of the ‘imaginary father’ makes clear the significance of Eliot’s creation of Agatha in achieving ambivalence. Elaborating on the connection Geary draws between Campbell’s and Kristeva’s work in chapter 3, Eliot’s portrayal of Agatha implies a relationship between maternal form, the semiotic, the symbolic and the perception of the ‘imaginary father’.
In melodrama, Eliot finds a way to explore and reflect more objectively upon maternal ambivalence and his ambivalence towards the maternal feminine. The Family Reunion is Eliot’s revaluation of the lifelong legacy of his mother on his personal, poetic and religious development and attitude towards women.
