Eliot's desire for privacy
"suppress everything suppressable"
Line 408

Eliot wrote in The Waste Land:

405)  By this, and this only, we have existed
406)  Which is not to be found in our obituaries
407)  Or in memories draped by the beneficent spider
408)  Or under seals broken by the lean solicitor
409)  In our empty rooms

Regarding Eliot's desire for privacy after his death Carole Seymour-Jones, wrote in Painted Shadow, p. 513:

Vivienne^* felt sure that Tom had made a will, leaving 'everything without exception' to her--apart from his ring and his stick to Henry^**--and that she and Geoffrey Faber were joint trustees of his literary estate and would inherit Eliot's copyrights.⁷³ In this she was deeply mistaken: by 18 February 1938 Eliot was pressing John Hayward to act as his literary executor, pleading that he knew no one except John whom he could altogether trust in that capacity, and stressing his 'mania for posthumous privacy'. Your job, Eliot wrote to Hayward, would be 'to suppress everything suppressable, however F & F^*** might be tempted'.⁷⁴

Seymour-Jones notes:

• 73) VE Diary, 1 January 1935, Bodleian^****.
• 74) TSE to JH, 18 February 1938, John Hayward Bequest, King's College, Cambridge. Eliot wrote that he always counted on making a new will every five years, so Hayward's commitment need only be for that period.

Exploring The Waste Land notes:

^*Vivienne

Vivienne Haigh-Wood Eliot, Eliot's first wife. They were seperated at this time. Sometimes she used the spelling Vivien.

^**Henry

Henry Ware Eliot Jr., Eliot's older brother. Henry was also a Harvard graduate.

^***F & F

Faber and Faber, Ltd., Eliot's publisher. Eliot was also employed as a director in the firm.

^****Bodleian

The Bodleian Library, Oxford University http://www.bodley.ox.ac.uk/