Vivienne Haigh-Wood Eliot Vivienne Haigh-Wood Eliot Vivienne Haigh-Wood Eliot (28 May 1888 – 22 January 1947) was the first wife of American poet T. S. Eliot, whom she wed in 1915, while he was studying at Oxford. They were never compatible; he seems to have been seeking a pretext to stay in England, in defiance of his family, by marrying an English bride. Haigh-Wood had always suffered from serious health problems, compounded by insecurity about her social class. It is clear that her disastrous marriage worsened her condition. Eliot would not consider divorce, but formally separated from her in 1933. She was committed
T. S. Eliot religious sensibility." After this, he worked on more "commercial" plays for more general audiences: "The Family Reunion" (1939), "The Cocktail Party" (1949), "The Confidential Clerk", (1953) and "The Elder Statesman" (1958) (the latter three were produced by Henry Sherek and directed by E. Martin Browne). The Broadway production in New York of "The Cocktail Party" received the 1950 Tony Award for Best Play. Eliot wrote "The Cocktail Party" while he was a visiting scholar at the Institute for Advanced Study. Regarding his method of playwriting, Eliot explained, "If I set out to write a play, I start by an act