Eliot begins part III of Little Gidding addressing the issue of attachment, indifference and detachment, he says that they are “three conditions which often look alike/ Yet differ completely, flourish in the same hedgerow.” While all three states may appear similar attachment and are opposing one another while indifference remains between them. Eliot then talks about what I think is detachment, but this is something that I had trouble reading and am not sure about. From what I read I think he is saying that detachment comes from an understanding of the things in our past, of memory, he says: “This is the use of memory: / For liberation- not less of love but expanding/ Of love beyond desire.” So while the use of memory is detachment, detachment is preferable because it allows for a greater type of love, a love beyond desire. Eliot goes on to discuss detachment in terms of action, he says “Thus, love of a country/ begins as attachment to our own field of action/ And comes to find that action of little importance/ Though never indifferent. History may be servitude, / History may be freedom. See, now they vanish, / The faces and places, with the self which, as it could, loved/them, / To become renewed, transfigured, in another pattern. ” Yet again I might be completely off base on this but what I think Eliot is saying here is that the importance we believe to accompany our actions is fleeting over time is lost allowing for detachment. It is this detachment and not indifference that is important, while indifference is not caring at all detachment is important because of its connection to memory: memory allows us to see the real importance of our action and their meaning but does not control our actions, it remains in the past. Wow, I think this might be one of those things that makes sense in my head but doesn’t really translate into a cohesive though on paper, sorry! But I guess what I am trying to say here is that detachment doesn’t mean the same thing as indifference, it is something that allows us to recognize and give meaning to actions but still keeps us above them enough so that they do not control our actions. Our memory allows us to be liberated beyond things like desire and to gain a real understanding of ourselves, our atman, if you will. We are able to “see, now they vanish, The faces and places, with the self which, as it could, loved them, to become renewed, transfigured, in another pattern.” Memory allows us to become detached and then understand the transcendental nature of ourselves and the things around us, how we are able to be constantly renewed in the cyclical nature of things… I think.
This whole idea of detachment seems to me to be basically taken right out of the Gita, Krishna explains to Sanjaya the importance of detachment and the ways that everything is “renewed, transfigured, in another pattern.” He tells him, “the wise grieve neither for the living nor the dead. There has never been a time when you and I and the kings gathered here have not existed, nor will there be a time when we will cease to exist…The wise are not deluded by these changes” (this is from lines 11-14 in chapter 2 of my translation). Like Eliot, Krishna that the idea of love is central in the idea of detachment and finding happiness, he tells Arjuna that “This supreme Lord who pervades all existence, the true Self of all creatures, may be realized through undivided love.” It seems that in both the Gita and Four Quartets memory is more than just being able to remember something from the past instead it seems more of an all encompassing force, remembering Krishna is remembering everything since he is comprised of all things, equally Eliot seems to describe moments in time as made up of both the past and present, while I am still a little confused on both things it seems that both view memory as a comprehensive understanding of things. However it is memory that remains of vital importance to both Eliot and Krishna, echoed in Krishna’s directions to Arjuna to “Remember me.” So while I am not all that sure what I have actually come to say in this blog I think that the main thing is that both Eliot and the Gita place an importance on memory and detachment, yet how those two fit together is still a bit foggy to me!