Thomas Stearns Eliot (1888–1965) was a distinguished American poet, one of the founders of the modernist movement in poetry, as well as a playwright and literary critic. He was born on September 26, 1888, in St. Louis, Missouri. His father was a successful businessman and his mother a teacher who also wrote poetry. He was the youngest of six children, having four sisters and one brother, all between eight and nineteen years older than him. Born with a congenital double hernia, he was forced to wear a special support bandage and was generally a physically fragile child.
During his studies in English literature at Harvard University, he began writing poetry and publishing it in the university’s literary magazine. In 1910 he traveled to Europe, staying mainly in Paris, where he studied French literature. In 1911 he returned to Harvard and enrolled as a doctoral student in philosophy.
In 1914 he returned to Europe to continue his studies at Oxford. Two decisive events occurred during this period. First, he met the poet Ezra Pound, who encouraged him and helped introduce his work to London’s literary circles. Second, he secretly married Vivienne Haigh-Wood (1888–1947) without informing his parents. As a result, he settled permanently in England and gradually became estranged from his family in America.
After completing his studies, Eliot worked for a time as a teacher and later as a bank clerk. At the same time, he wrote essays, poems, reviews, and plays. His marriage was troubled, and Vivienne appears to have suffered from serious psychological problems. In 1921, Eliot collapsed from physical and mental exhaustion, as he was working long hours at the bank while devoting all his free time to writing. He entered a sanatorium, where he completed his best-known work, *The Waste Land*.
His circumstances improved in 1925 when he left the bank to work for a publishing house. However, the difficulties in his marriage continued. The couple eventually separated, and Vivienne was later committed to a psychiatric hospital, where she died in 1947. During these years Eliot's reputation continued to grow, and in 1948 he was awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature.
In 1957 he married his secretary, Valerie Fletcher, who brought him the domestic happiness he had long sought. Their years together, however, were limited by his declining health. In 1964 he made one final journey to his homeland. Later that year, while at his home in London, he suffered a stroke and fell into a coma. He died in January 1965 from emphysema-related complications.
According to his wishes, the following line from his poem "Four Quartets" was inscribed on his memorial: “In my beginning is my end. In my end is my beginning.”
