The Shudder

Frank Kermode tries to suss out what Eliot meant by having “a shudder” while reading, a standard by which Eliot defined good poetry and prose, such as in Tennyson’s In Memoriam. “Shudder’ is a bit surprising coming from the stately Eliot, though the experience to which he refers may in some forms be common enough. He certainly experienced it, or something that puts him or us in mind of it.”