The stories of the death of the self and the resurrection of life : D.H. Lawrence's "The Prussian officer" and "England, my England"
著者(英) Gaku Iwai
journal or
publication title
Core
number 24
page range 11‑28
year 1995‑03‑15
URL http://doi.org/10.14988/pa.2017.0000015016
The Stories 10the Death 01 the Seli and the R田Ullection01 lile: D. H. La問問閃'sihePrussi祖Officer"狙d'England, My England" 11
T h e S t o r i e s o f t h e D e a t h o f t h e S e l f a n d t h e R e s u r r e c t i o n o f l i f e : D . H . L a w r e n c e γ ' T h e P r u s s i
組O f f i c e r "a n dE n g l a n d , My E n g l a n d "
IWAI Gaku
The death of the hero closes both The Prussian Officer" and England, My England." The two men begin in entirely different situations: the hero of The Prussian Officer" is an orderly in the army; the hero of England, My England" is a young living husband in the country. The differences in their situations make it all the more surprising that the experience which the two men have just before they di巴isso similar: both of them donot comprehend what is before their eyes; both of them feel that reality in not the world they have been in before, but th巴darkworld in which they wan‑
der just before their deaths; both of them at last abandon themselves to the flux of the dark world.
In spite of these remarkable similarities, the world that the heroes ex‑ perience at the end of their lives has not been discussed fully.l If we ex‑ amine the whole stories, however, we can trace the heroes' passages from what we usually think of as the ordinary world into a new world, which both recognize as reality. In these stories the h巴roescross the bordεr be‑ tween the two worlds. They do not avert their eyes from reality, but accept it
1 .
The Prussian Officer"The Prussian Officer" has been acknowledged and discussed as oneof
12 The S加ir田01阪Dea出01由eSelf and the Resurrection l01ile: D. H. La'開 問s'"The Prussi組Offi問r'副首gland,MyEngl組r Lawrence's best stories. The critics often focus their arguments on the re‑ lationship between the Captain and the order1y, maintaining that it is homosexual or sadomasochistic.2 As this suggests, the Captain and the orderly entertain complex feelings towards each other, and their rela‑ tionship seems to be in some way abnormal. Beneath their consciousness, they feel each other's existence. The Captain seeks to satisfy himself by bullying the orderly, and the orderly at first bears the bullying. The order‑ ly possesses th巴forceof a warm, natural vitality, whereas the power the Captain exercises is the opposite of the orderly's. The officer's is cold, icy fire. The battle between the two men is a battle between the two different kinds of power. When the Captain faces with the vital flame of the order‑ ly, he is enraged by it, and tries to extinguish it with his cold fire
The Captain and the orderly are of the opposite natures. The Captain is of a frigid nature. His tall and slim figure, and his frowning, cold face do not seem to be easily moved. He often ponders himself and his life, and sometimes he feels filled with remorse. He scarcely has any personal com‑
munication with other soldiers. On the other hand, the orderly has a vital spark. This young and vivacious fellow acts according to his instinct without thinking:
The orderly was a youth of about twenty‑two, of medium height, and well‑built. He had strong, heavy limbs, was swarthy, with a soft, black, young moustache. There was something altogether warm and young about him. He had firmly marked eyebrows over dark, expressionless eyes, that seemed never to have thought, only to have received life direct through his senses, and acted straight from instinc t.(PO 2‑3)3
The Captain and the orderly are excited by each other's existence. They
The Stories 01由eDea由。1the Sefl削 除Resurr配tiOll01life: D. H.い開E悦γThePrussian Officer"刷England,My Engl訓, 13 seem never before to have been associated with another person so deeply as they are now with each other. N 0 woman has ever moved the Captain to marriage. He sometimes takes a mistress, but being with a woman only makes him irritated with himself, as if the relationship with a woman was a betrayal of himself. He tends to keep himself isolated and aloof from other men. The orderly has a sweetheart, but their relationship is not pas‑ sionate and intense, but calm and placid: He went with her, not to talk, but to have his arm round her . . . he could rest with her held fast against his chest" (PO 5). Nor does he have deep relationships with his friends: By nature he was active, and had many fri巴nds.He thought what amazing good fellows they were. But, without knowing it, he was alone" (PO 5) The two solitary men are awakened to e且chother's existence as they have never been before by other people. They establish without plan or con‑ sciousness a deep, subterranean relationship.
They are a remarkably matching pair.4 Each is the opposite nature of the other. Each of them needs the other. They feel the irresistible impuls巴
beneath their consciousness. They seem to b巴apair which can be in a state of equilibrium.5
The Captain is irritated by the orderly's vital flame, but at the same time it stirs a kind of fascination in him: In spite of himself, the Captain could not regain his neutrality of feeling towards his orderly. Nor could he leave the man alone. In spite of himself, he watched him, gave him sharp orders, tried to take up as much of his time as possible" (PO 4). He ex‑ pects some reaction from his servant to his passionate bullying, and con‑ tinues to goad him. The orderly, however, does not respond; the orderly decides to bear the officer's bul1ying: The youth instinctively tried to keep himself intac :the tried to serv巴theofficer as if the latter were an ab‑
14 The S柏ries01 the Death 01 the Se ailnd the Resurrection 01 lile: D. H. Lawrence'sThe Prussian Officer" and 'England, My England"
stract authority, and not a man. All his instinct was to avoid personal con‑ tact, even definite hate. But in spite of himself the hate grew, responsive to the officer's passion. However, he put it in the background" (PO 5). The Captain cannot bear to be ignored by the orderly: As yet, the soldi巴rhad held himself off from the elder man. The Captain grew madly irritable. He could not rest when the soldier was away, and when he was present, he glared at him with tormented eyes" (PO 4‑5). The orderly's endurance spurs the Captain on more and more to violent act. At last, when he dis‑ covers that his servant sometimes spends a night with a girl friend, his passionate anger and jealousy lead him to kicking his servant.
One night at dinner the Captain, noticing a pencil in his servant's ear, asks him what he has been doing. When the orderly crouches to set down the dishes without answering the question, the Captain kicks him over and over. The Captain suppresses the memory of his shameful behaviour, but the orderly is deeply shocked. The orderly spends a night in torm巴nt.The next morning he feels completely nullified. He feels he has lost his vital‑ ity, has lost his own nature:
The orderly must move under the presence of the figure of the horseman [the Captain]. 1t was not that he was afraid, or cowed. 1t was as if he were disembowelled, made empty, like an empty shell. He f巴lthimself as nothing, a shadow creeping under the sunshine. . . . He wanted to stay in shadow, not to be forced into consciousness. (PO 11)
The orderly seems to have been conquered by his master. His vital flame is almost extinguished by his officer's cold flame. 1n this extreme situa‑ tion, however, his suppr巴ssedenergy suddenly gathers in the core of his life. Th巴 accumulated vitality changes into a destructIve force, and
The Stories 10the Death 01 the Self and the Resurrechon 01life: D. H. La明enceγThePru罰 則Officer"祖d"England, My England" 15 furiously explodes: when they are out on manoeuvres, the orderly murders the Captain
At that very moment, the orderly destroys what is necessary to his life; he loses the man who is the other pole in his equilibrium. When he kills the Captain and sees the corpse, he seems to know at last the gravity of what he has done:
1t [the corpse] shocked and distressed him. Slowly, he got up. . 1t represented more than the thing which had kicked and bullied him. He was afraid to 100k at the eyes They were hideous now, . . . But he cou1d not b田 rto see the long, military body lying broken over the tree‑base, the fine fingers crisped. H巳wantedto hide it away. (PO 15)
He fee1s that he himself has di巴d: Theorderly sat by it [the corpse] for a few moments. Here his own life a1so ended" (PO 15). The equilibrium being broken, h巴isdeprived of what is essentia1 to his 1if巴.He is scat‑ tered and becomes a mere stray.,6 ,
Thus he begins to wander about. The experience h巳 has d uring the wandering will be discussed later. 1n the forest he seems to wander aim1ess1y, but in fact he is attracted to the mountains. The image of the co1d, snowy mountains coincides with that of the Captain.7 That is the reason that the orderly, having 10st the Captain, is attracted to the moun‑
tains. At the end of the story when his body is 1aid n巴xtto the corpse of the Captain, h巴S巴emsto regain his p1ace at 1ast in equilibrium with his master: The bodies of the two men 1ay together, sid巴 byside, in the mortuary, the one [the Captain's] white and slender, but 1aid rigid1y at rest, the oth巴r[the orderly's]looking as if巴V巴rymoment it must rouse into life again, so young and unused, from a slumber" (PO 20‑21)
16 The Stories 01 the Death 01 the Self and the Res町rection01 lile: D. H. La'聞価問、寸hePru四i組Officer"and'Engla,吋MyEngl釦r
I I .
"England,My
England"The first half of England, My England" centers on the relationship be‑ tween a young husband and wife, whose natures are different from each other. There is a conflict between country life and city life, towards which the couple shows different affinities. Winifred at last goes back to city life, while Egbert leaves both country life and city life, and goes into the army.
Egbert is of a romantic nature. He h丘sspent his whole life in country, away from the urban world of business: He came from a decent family, from a pleasant country home, from delightful surroundings" (EME 10).8 These surroundings have formed his nature. He is a born boh巴mlan: Egbert had no intention of coming to grips with life" (EME 10). His life is a fantasy of the old England: He would try and live in the spirit of these [the past, the old music and dances and customs of old England ,]not in the spirit of the world of business" (EMEIO). He cannot live outside of country; only when he is in country, he can live his life.
On the other hand, Winifred has been brought up in London. There Winifred has seen people working to earn their living. Her father has be‑ come moderately rich through his business interests in London, where he and his family live. Winifred has lived in the world of business, and she comes to the country from another world.9
The country man and the urban woman came to live in Crockham. Se‑ cluded in the country, they are free from the w四 rand tear in the world of business. They are free from social duties. The place is not yet dirti巴dby the modern civilization, which often spoils humanity: The spear of mod‑
ern invention had not passed through it [the country) . . ." (EME 8). In the
The Stori回oftheD朗自of出eSelf組dthe ResurrecIlon of life: D. H. La岡ence's"The Pr邸i組Officer"姐d''Engl佃d,MyEngl佃d" 17 country is still found the spirit and mild, relaxed atmosphere of the old England surrounded by nature: Strange how the savage England lingers in patches: as here, amid these shaggy gorse commons, and marshy, snake‑ infested places near the foot of the south downs. The spirit of place lin‑ gering on primeval, as when th巴 Saxonscame, so long ago" (EME 5) Such a place allows the two to live as if in a romance: They too felt that they did not belong to the London world any more. Crockham had changed their blood . . ." (EME 8).
Their attachment to the country is, however, different from each other, as a result of the difference in their natures. Living in his own place, Egbert is always absorbed in tending its garden and in cultivating lots of flowers: He worked away, in his shirt‑sleeves, worked al1 day intermit‑ tently doing this thing and the other" (EME 9). With his utmost affection for nature, he creates a flowery paradise there: He had made it flame with flowers, in a sun cup under its hedges and trees. So old, so Qld a place! And yet he had re‑created it" (EME 5‑6).
Winifred and her father also become attracted to the life in the quiet country: Winifred is content only to see her husband labouring and to be near him; her father thinks it splendid that the beautiful young couple live in the country and passionately love each other. It is, however, not be‑ cause they are essentially of a romantic nature, but because they have not experienced country life before. They desire it simply as the outsiders: Town‑bred, everything seemed to her splendid, and the very digging and shovelling itself seemed romantic. . . . To the man [the father] who in Lon‑
don still worked hard to k巳epsteady his modest fortune, the thought of this young couple digging aw旦yand loving one another down at Crock‑ ham Cottage . . . was like a chapter of living romance" (EME 9)
18 The Stories 10the Dea出01the Se fland the R出urrection1 I0if D:e. H. LawrenceγThe Prussian Offi似,and "England, My England"
In this paradise, the difference between Egbert and Winifred is at first hardly perceptible and does not affect their life. The birth of their chil‑ dren, however, opens their eyes, and makes them aware of their difference
Egbert refuses to accept his responsibility as a father, while Winifred does accept hers as a mother. They need more money for their children in addi‑ tion to what they already have, but Egbert does not or cannot work to earn it:he simply would not giv巴himselfto what Winifred called life,
Work" (EME 12). Winifred's father gives her more money. Egbert has no mind to help the development of his children's inner part as usual fathers do. He quotes the saying of
J
esus A little child shall lead them"‑to ex‑ cuse himself for taking responsibility for influencing his children: A lit‑ tle child shall lead them‑' His child should lead, then. He would try not to make it go in any direction whatever. He would abstain from influenc‑ ing it ‑ Liberty!ー "(EME 16‑17). On the other hand, Winifred does accept her responsibility though she lacks affection for the children But she had what the modern mother so often has in the place of spontan巴ous love: a profound sense of duty towards her child" (EME 11).Then, Egbert begins to be aware that Winifred believes that what is most important for herself is to fulfill her duty towards her childr巴n.He realizes that her love for him is becoming less and less: after Annabel came, then Egbert began truly to realise how it was. His wife still loved him. But‑and now the but had grown enormous‑her physical love for him was of secondary importance to her. It became ever less important"
(EME 11‑12). Winifred understands that she canεxp巴ctnothing from him in what she thinks of as life'; that he is not a mainstay but just an acces‑ sory in life: He did not stand firm in the landsc呂peof h巴rlife like a tower of strength, like a great pillar of significance. . . He was like a flower in
The Stori問。,fthe Death of the Self and目曲R白山町蜘oflife:D.H以 岡 阻 田'8寸hePm田ian0日ば祖d"England, My E昭加d" 19 the garden, trembling in the wind of life, and then gone, leaving nothing to show" (EME 12). Thus, they become conscious of their situatIon.
At this point, J oyce's accident happens. Their eld巴stchild, J oyce, is in‑ jured by a sickle Egbert has left lying on th巴 巳dgeof the grass. Joyce's accident forces them to give up their life in the country. Her injury at first does not seem to be gr呂ve.But it becomes inflamed, and Winifred's fath巴r decides to send J oyce to a nursing home for proper treatmen t.Winifred and her father take J oyce to London. They leave the country for the Lon‑
don world," while Egbert is left miserable in the country: they [Winifred and her father] rolled slowly away from Crockham, and from Egbert who stood ther己bareheadedand丘littleignominious, left behind" (EME 23) Thus, Joyce's accident caus白 Winifredto have to leave their country par司
adise
This makes an unbridgeable gulf betweεn them. Alienated from the country and Egbert, Winifred str巳ngthensher family's bond: "Her father and mother, herself, and her child, that was the human trinity for her. Her husband‑? . . . Egbert was out of it" (EME 11). Always nursing the injured child, Winifred no long巴rhas any thought of supporting her husband as a wife, and her physical passion for Egbert no longer excites her: As a wife she had no sense of duty: only a certain bitterness towards the man with whom she had known such s巳nsualityand distractIon. She was purely the Mater Dolorata. To the man she was closed as a tomb" (EME 23). Egbert is completely left outside of her life and her mind
The romance being destroyed, Egbert can no longer be as he was in the garden. He goes to London to see his children, but town is outside his sphere: Egbert now had no real home. Winifred with the children and nurse was tied to the little flat in London. He could not liv巴th巴re:he
20 TheStori,f刷the Death of the Sdf and the Resurrection o lfife: D. H. La岡田的ThePrussi祖Officer"制England,My England"
could not contain himself" (EME 24)ー Hegoes back to his old paradise, but the romance has already been finished, and the garden and the cottage are nothing but a bleak, dreary and solitary place. He sometimes spends a day in the garden. He sometimes stays in the empty house at night. The country just augments his isolation:
Th印 withthe empty house around him at night, all the empty rooms, he felt his heart go wicked. The sense of frustration and futility, like some slow, torpid snake, slowly bit right through his heart. Futility, futility, futility: the horrible marsh‑poison went through his veins and killed him. (EME 24)
He becomes an outcast. N ot only in town, but also in any place, in the garden nor in his old house, he is no longer at home. He gives in to his desperation. H巴movesaimlessly from one place to another
During his wandering, he accumulates energy within himself. His deso‑ late state and his remorse for poor child make him wick日d.He leaves his shirt torn. He gains a savage, Dionysian spirit His heart went back to the savage old spirit of the place: the desire for old gods, old, lost passions, the passion of the cold‑blooded, darting snakes . . . the mystery of blood‑ sacrifices . . . The seethe of a lost, dark passion in the air" (EME 24‑25). Thus, his innate desire for destruction emerges. This energy can be called destructive energy.lO
This destructive energy changes him. Winifred has wanted him to be a great pillar of significance." This is not a dynamic but a static pillar, on whom she can depend in what she thinks of as real life. Egbert, however, becomes a dynamic and vital great pillar," by whom Winifred is fright‑ ened: The vεry way he stood, so quiet, so insidious, like an erect, supple
The Stories o tfhe Death of the Se fland the R町urrectionof life: D. H. La胴回目's'ThePrussi組αfi閃f銀dEngl姐d,My Engl佃d" 21 symbol of life, the living body, confronting her downcast soul, was torture to her. He was like a supple living idol moving before her eyes, and she felt if she watched him she was damned" (EME 26)Thus, this Ishmael, as Lawrence calls him, has by d巴grees accumulated the destructive force And he at last rejects both country life and city life, and goes to the war.
The destructive force drives him out of his sphere to participate in war When the war breaks out, he decides to join the army It is not because he is a patriot; he does not care whether England wins or loses. Nor because he desires to be a soldier; he detests being ordered about by others. The re:al reason for his enlistment is that he is moved to it by the destructive fOl.'ce that has accumulated in him. His d田tructivenature y回rnsfor i t.ll He at last rejects both country life and city life, and goes to the war in order to be an agent of destruction.
Throwing himself into the war from the ordin品ryworld, he goes to the extr巴mity:his sensibility is lost; his physique is destroyed; h巴b巴comes more and more terrible and ugly. At last he seems to go beyond the living world He seemed alr巴adyto have gone out of life, beyond the pale of life" (EME 30). In this extreme state, he begins to experience new reality.
国.The Ego‑less
W
orld.Thus both Egbert and the orderly in The Prussian Officer," from an ordinary situation, go to the extremity: the orderly is, conquered by his master, nulliiied, and loses his vital spark; Egbert, left alone by his wife and children, loses his romantic nature, and begins to wander about. Then destructive energy, another aspect of life,日merges:th巳orderly'sdestruc‑ tive energy bursts out, and he strangles his master; Egbert's destructive energy drives him to the war. As a result oi this, they lose their place: th巴
22 TheStori。問,fthe D朗自of白eSelf血dtheR関町配tionof life: D H.. La凹叩旬、 ThePrussian Officer" and "England, My England"
orderly is driven out of the equilibrium with his master; Egbert is driven out of his bygone paradise. After that both experience new world.
When they are in their extremity, they cross the bord巳rbetween the ordinary world and th巴dark,unknown world. In the new world of reality, they no longer see the world through the film of their ego. They have lost their self‑insistent wil l.The world is no longer articulated by language This world is not lighted by the reason of mankind
When they lose thεir ego, the world which surrounds them first changes its appearance. The orderly is surprised at the unfamiliar world: It sur‑ prised him that the leaves were glittering in the sun, and the chips of wood reflecting white from the ground. For him a change had come over the world. But for the rest it had not‑all seemed the same" (PO 16). Egbert does not compr巳hendwhat he sees: Were they th巴starsin the dark sky? Was it possible it was stars in the dark sky? Stars? The world? Ah, no, he could not know it' Stars and the world wer巴gonefor him, h巳
closed his eyes町 Nostars, no sky, no world" (EME 33). The world is no longer articulated by language, which was borne by the ego and reason of human beings. The orderly does not have language to communicate with a farmer, who now lives in another world from the one the orderly is in:
The woman moved on, away from him. He had no language with which to speak to her. She was th巴bright,solid unreality. She would make a noise of words that would confuse him, and her eyes would look at him without seeing him" (PO 19)
The world is darkness, which is th巴 oppositeto the ev巴rydayworld, which is lighted and且rrangedby reason. The orderly compr巴h巴ndsthat only he has com巴tothe dark world, and other people who live in the ev田 eryday world should also come:
The Stories of the Death of the Self and出eResurrec加nof life: D. H. Lawrence's "The Prussi組Offlcer"組d"England, My England" 23 He had never been here b巴fore.Was it life, or not‑life? He was by himself. They were in a big bright place, those oth巴rs,and he was outside. The town, all the country,丘bigbright place of light: and he was outside, her,巳in the dark巴nedopen beyond, where each thing existed alone. But they would all have to come out there sometime, those others. Little, and left behind him, they all were. There had been father and mother and sweetheart. What did they all matter. This was the open land. (PO 18)
Egbert also remembers the world where he has been, but he knows that there is a darkness, into which he is no longer afraid of going:
There had b巴巴nlife. There had been .Winifred and his children. But the frail death‑agony effort to catch at straws of memory, straws of 1ife from the past, brought on too great a nausea. N 0, no! No Winifred, no chi1dren. No world, no peop1e. Better th巴
agony of disso1ution ahead than the nausea of the effort back‑ wards. (EME 33)
This dark world is their rea1ity. The orderly fee1s h巴 isin reali ty: He was conscious of a sense of arrival. He was amid the reality, on the rea1, dark bottom" (PO 19). He does not want to go back to his form巴rlife:
"And he no longer be10nged to it [his former 1ife]‑he sat there, beyond, like丘manoutside in the dark. He had gone out from everyday life into the unknown, and he could not, he even did not want to go back" (PO 16) Egbert, too, wants to be in the flux of the dark world rather than go back to what he had formerly thought of as rea1ity Better the terri b1日work shou1d go forward, the dissolving into the black sea of death, in the ex‑ tremity of disso1ution, than that there should b巴anyreaching back to‑ wards life" (EME 33)
24 The Stori田01血eDea由。i出eSelf祖d血eR田町配h岨01lile: D. H. La前 回 目γThePrussi佃O血ωf祖d"England, My Engl佃d"
What they should or can do now is just to leave themselves to the flux of the ego‑less world. That is the opposite of articulating, arranging, and systematizing the world, or dividing the world and establishing order by the reason of mankind, by the measure of human beings. Egbert at last knows that he should leave himself to the stream of darkness, giving up his self‑insistent will: To break the core and the unit of life, and to lapse out on the great darkness Only that. To break the clue, and mingle and commingle with the one d昌rkness,without afterwards or forwards. . . . Let the wi1l of man break and give up" (EME 33).
It is, however, not easy to be in the darkness; it n巴edsgreat courage. In his essay The Reality of Peace," Lawrence explains the necessity for the darkness and the courage required for it
But first it needs the act of courage: that we yield up our will to the unknown, that we deliver our course to the current of the in‑ visible. . . . 1t is the courage which yields itself to the perfectest suggestion from within、Whena man yields himself implicitly to the suggestion which transcends him, when he accepts gently and honourably his own creative fate, he is beautiful and b巴yond
12
asperslOn.
Lawrence thought people had to give up their detestable life, and had to give themselves up the new reality, in which they no longer act according to their ego or self‑insist巴ntwill In that they would fulfill their lives. But it is very few who have the courage to do this. Lawrence craves for men who dare go into the new world, which is reality:
Who dares leap off from the old world into the inception of the new? . . . Who dares leap into the tide of new life? Who dares to perish from the old static entity, lend himself to the unresolved
The Stories 01由eDeatb 10由eSe fland tbe Res叩ection01 lile: D .H. La問問的寸'heP周知四Offi悶"組d''Engl組d,MyE昭加d"25 wonder? Who dares have done with his old self? Who dares have done with himself, and with all the rest of the old‑established world; who dares have done with his righteousness; who dares have done with humanity? 1t is time to have done with all these, and be given to the unknown which will come to pass.13
Who are they? They呂retwo heroes 01 The Prussian Officer" and Eng司 land, My England."
These men, though they hesitate at first, le呂vethemselves in the dark‑ ness. Lawrence describes them with great sympathy: the young, vivacious orderly, and the husband who deeply loves nature and old England. He lets them experience reality. Lawrence gives them the possibility to go into the new world, where he thought there might be real life, wh巴rethey could fulfill their true lifε. To leave themselves to the flux of the ego‑less world is th巴oneand only chance given for rebirth, for the renewal of life.
Notes
1. For example, Kingsley Widmer in The Art of Perversi砂':D. H. Lawr印ceき Shorter Fictions (Seattle: Washington UP, 1962), attributes the way to the dark wor1d too easily to Lawrence's deeper nihilism and a longing for death" (21) W eldon Thornton in D. H. Lawrence: A Stuaかοifthe Short Fiction (N ew Y ork Twayne, 1993), argues it too indecisively: It is not clear why Lawrence de‑ scribes so fully Egbert's military exp巴rience,especially his drift tow呂rddeath It may be he sensed a similar process at work in our culture or a similar temp‑ tation in himself且ndneeded to explore it fully" (49).
2. See, for example, Graham Hough, The Dark Sun: A S.初砂ofD. H. Lawrence (London: Duckworth, 1956): The Prussian Officer' is a repulsively powerful story of a sadistic, quasi‑homosexual relation between the officer and his peasant order1y" (171).
3. D. H. Lawrence, The Prussian Officer仰 dOther Stories, ed. J ohn W orthen (Cambridge: Cambridge UP, 1983). All subsequent quotations are from this edition and the page number丘ppearsin parentheses in the text, proceeded by
26 The Stories of the D伺出ofthe Sell and the ResUllechon of life: D. H. La明leli的'ThePr附ian0値目r!1細d'E略i租d,MyE昭land"
the abbreviation P
o .
4. Keith Cushman in D. H. Lawrence at Work: The Emergence of the Prussian Officer Stories (Charlottesville: Harvester, 1978), says that the Captain and his orderly are a complementary pair" and examines their opposing features (170) 5. Their bully‑bullied relationship reminds us of that of Mino and a female cat
in chapter "Mino" of Women in Love eds. David Farmer,.Lindeth Vasey, and John Worthen (Cambridge: Cambridge UP, 1987). Mino, with manly noncha‑ lanc,巴 unreason旦bly bullies the female cat, and she obediently receives it. Seeing this, Birkin says to Ursula that Mino does not bully the female cat from a mere Wille zur Macht," but tries to let her acknowledge a kind of her fate, an orbit in the univers巴 Butwith the Mino, it is the desire to bring this female cat into a pure stable equilibrium, a tr且nscendent在ndabiding rapp町t with the single male.‑Whereas without him, as you see, she is a mere stray, a fluffy sporadic bit of chaos'" (150). 1n his essay寸heCrown," in Phoenix II:
Uncollected, Unpublished, and Other Prose Works by D. H. Lawrence, eds. Warren Roberts, and Harry T. Moore (London: Heinemann, 1968), Lawrence says the equilibrium between those which have the opposite nature: Is not the unicorn necessary to the very existence of the lion, is not e且chopposite kept in stable equilibrium by the opposition of the other?" (366)
6. Lawrence in his previous essay also tells the fate of the one who breaks the equilibrium; this explains the orderly's being scattered and wandering just af ter his murder: But think, if the lion really destroyed, killed the unicorn: not merely drove him out of town, but annihilated him! Would not the lion at once expire, as if he had created a vacuum around himself? . . . This is a terrible position: to have for a raison d苦trea purpose which, if once fulfilled, would of necessity entail the cessation from existence of both opponents. Th巴ywould both cease to be, if either of them really won in the fight which is their sole reason for exising. . . . But the lion will not be destroyed. If he were, if he wer巴swallowedinto the belly of the unicorn, the unicorn would fly asunder into chaos.. . And there is no rest, no cessation from the conflict. For we are two opposites which exist by virtue of our inter‑opposition. Remove the opposition and there is collapse, a sudd巴ncrumbling into universal nothing‑ ness" (Phoenix II, 366‑68)
7. To confirm this view, compare
The Stories 01the Dea血01the Sell and血eRes師 側on 01life: D. H. L胴ence's寸hePrussian0伍cd制England,My Englan~' 27 into this coloured mirage before his [the orderly's] eyes. The Captain, a small, light‑blue and scarlet fig ure , was trotting evenly between the strips of corn, along the level brow of the hill. • • • Proud and sure moved the horseman fig ure, the quick, bright thing, in which was concentrated all the light of this morning, which for the r巴stlay a fragile, shining shadow" (PO 12). While, the mountain is silently in full glare in the sky: Behind the soft, grey ridge of the ne昌restrange the further mountains stood golden and pale grey, the snow all radiant like pure, soft gold. So still, gleaming in the sky, fashioned pure out of the ore of the sky, they shone in their silence" (PO 19)
8. D. H. Lawrence, Englan ,dMy England and Other Stories, ed. Bruce Steele (Cambridge: Cambridge UP, 1990). All subsequent quotations are from this edition and the page number appears in the text in parentheses proceeded by the abbreviation EME.
9. Thornton distinguishes the two modes of their Iivesぉ the品esthetic"and the pragmatic" (Thornton, 43).
10. This energy seems to corrupt Egbert .Lawrence, how巴ver,sees two forces in am品n・creativeforce and destructive force. And he considers not only the for‑ mer, but also the latter to be the essential aspects in品man: Andthere is in me," he argues in his巴ssay TheRea1ity of Peace," in Phoenix: The Posthumous Papers of D. H. Lawrence, ed. Edward D. McDonala (London: Heinemann, 1936),the great desire of creation and the great desire of dissolution. Perhaps these two are pure equiv丘lents.. . . Cert品inlythe two are necessary each to the other; they are the systole‑diastole of the physical universe" (678).
11. Thornton regards Egbert's enlistment, which is opposed to his true nature,"
as the result of his self‑negation (Thornton, 48‑49). The first version of this story, however, helps us to confirm my reading. In the version, the hero Evelyn, in miserable state, begins to be excited by the destructive force: His consciousn巴sshad now a field of activity. The reaction in his soul could ce呂se from being neutral; it had a positive form to take. There, • • • he was aware of the positive activity of destraction, the seethe of friction, the waves of destruc tion seething to meet, the armies moving forward to fight. And this carried his soul along with it" (EME 224). In the army he obtains real satisfaction at being engaged in destructive activity He hated it [the war], and yet he was
28 The Stories 01 the Death 10the Self and the Res町田tion01 lile: D. H. LawrenceγThe Prussian OHicer" and "England, My E昭land"
this warring on men. This work of destruction alone satisfied his deepest de‑ sire" (EME 226).
12. Phoen叫 671 13. Phoenix, 673