LOVE
PASSION
The essential project of the Romantic Movement and the Left in the past 100 or more years, perhaps best expressed in the novels of Lawrence, is to replace Love with Passion. Love you see is a mutual thing. It requires interrelations and bonds which are anathema to the wholly nihilistic, individualistic and selfish intellectual elites of the Modern era. What in the end does Freudianism consist of, other than an attack on the foundations of the family? Passion on the other hand, requires nothing from anyone other than the individual. It does not require that the object of one's desires reciprocate. The individual, whole in himself, can experience passion. Lawrence, in these novels and others, tried to explore new alternatives to the traditional Western structures of marriage, family and Christianity. He hoped to recreate humans and human relations in new forms, unbound by tradition and reason. It is for this fundamental attack on the great accomplishments of Western Civilization that his books should have been banned, not because of some wildly melodramatic sex scenes in the haystacks. (Reviewed:) Grade: (F) Tweet Websites:See also:D.H. Lawrence (3 books reviewed)General Literature Library Journal: Top 150 of the Century Modern Library Top 100 Novels of the 20th Century -WIKIPEDIA: D. H. Lawrence -PODCAST: D. H. Lawrence in flames: A new biography of D. H. Lawrence, "the most judged writer of his age" (TLS, 5/27/21) - -ESSAY: Lady Chatterley isn’t sexy: D.H. Lawrence didn't champion the Sexual Revolution (NICHOLAS HARRIS, 12/08/22, UnHerd) -ESSAY: The D. H. Lawrence We Forgot: Lawrence became famous writing novels about sex. But his best stories—and his most profound achievements—reside elsewhere (Frances Wilson, The New Yorker) -REVIEW ESSAY: The Arch-Heretic: ‘The Bad Side of Books’ (George Scialabba, October 10, 2020, Commonweal) -ESSAY: Up close and dangerous: the irresistible allure of DH Lawrence: For decades he was wildly out of fashion, now DH Lawrence is everywhere – from novels and biographies to a new adaptation of Lady Chatterley’s Lover (Lara Feigel, 30 Aug 2021, The Guardian) -REVIEW ESSAY: The D. H. Lawrence We Forgot: Lawrence became famous writing novels about sex. But his best stories—and his most profound achievements—reside elsewhere (Frances Wilson, October 8, 2020, The New Yorker) -REVIEW: of Burning Man: The Ascent of D H Lawrence By Frances Wilson (David Wheatley, Literary Review) -REVIEW: of Burning MKan< (DJ Taylor, WSJ) -REVIEW: of Burning Man (Lara Feigel, New Republic) -REVIEW: of Burning Man (Daphne Merkin, BookForum) -REVIEW: of Burning Man (Troy Jollimore, Washington Post) -REVIEW: of Burning Man (Kathryn Hughes, NY Review of Books) -REVIEW: of ook! We Have Come Through! by Lara Feigel (Paul Dean, The Critic) - - Book-related and General Links: -DH Lawrence -Literary Research Guide: D(avid) H(erbert) Lawrence (1885 - 1930 ) -The Taming of D. H. Lawrence (J. M. COETZEE in NY Review of Books) Comments:he wasn't trying to create new forms of relationships...he portrayed them as they exist...as they have for a very long time...whether one realizes it or not that's another issue. and he argued FOR reason: what is this book but an arena for the continual battle of whits between all the lovers involved. one of the modernisms prevailing tenets is it's anti-dehumanization... exemplified in the industrialist-like gerald crich. progress is fine but not if it doesn't bring along the evolution of the soul. anyway, in one way yer right: lawrence's very sensibility is incriminating towards western culture. and for good reason. the state of the environment more than underscores this. to sum up i'd say this.....dh lawrence is compassionate and fearless; i think that it may be difficult to see this when the one who reads him lacks these same qualities. - jeff mooridian, jr - Mar-09-2007, 09:18 ******************************************************* Astonishing really that you could come out of Women in Love feeling that Lawrence would want to create or recreate anything. It was the controlling aspects of Gerald that Birkin (aka Lawrence) seemed to loathe and which ultimately resulted in tragedy. http://subtextwhore.co.uk - Subtext Whore - Sep-07-2004, 14:15 ******************************************************* You read novels in order to confirm what you know. I really don't like you. - Heath - Jul-04-2003, 04:21 ******************************************************* "It is for this fundamental attack on the great accomplishments of Western Civilization that his books should have been banned, not because of some wildly melodramatic sex scenes in the haystacks." This statement reveals more than anything I've read on your site that you'd be much happier in a different time in history. Say, a beaurocrat who happily pulled the trigger on his father and raped his mother before slitting her throat to earn his party cred in Stalinist Russia. Pure totalitarian drivel, comrade. Sincerely, Mike - Mike Lee - Apr-11-2003, 18:53 ******************************************************* |
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