The problematic relationship between the sexes, widely discussed in Lawrence's philosophical essays (i.e., Study of Thomas Hardy, The Crown, Fantasia of the Unconscious, etc.), pervades all his fiction. But in it, paradoxically, a satisfactory balance between the male and female principle is never completely achieved because of the overwhelming power exerted by one of them (mainly the female), with the result that either the relationship functions only for a temporary, passionate phase or it turns out to be utterly destructive. Written at the end of World War I, Aaron's Rod is the most radical attempt to question and lay bare the Angst of losing oneself in a heterosexual relationship and to find escape from personal and social entrapment in a homosexual one, which, throughout the novel, is felt as necessary and potential, but left hanging in a vacuum, reduced to unfulfilling verbal communication. In spite of the protagonist's nihilistic attitude, the heterosexual relationship is experienced as a potential danger created by the woman, which man is unable to resist, but which is responsible for his own personal loss and inner destruction (even before adventuring into it).
Sexuality's Mortal Trap: Sex and Contamination in Aaron's Rod
MICHELUCCI, STEFANIA
2000-01-01
Abstract
The problematic relationship between the sexes, widely discussed in Lawrence's philosophical essays (i.e., Study of Thomas Hardy, The Crown, Fantasia of the Unconscious, etc.), pervades all his fiction. But in it, paradoxically, a satisfactory balance between the male and female principle is never completely achieved because of the overwhelming power exerted by one of them (mainly the female), with the result that either the relationship functions only for a temporary, passionate phase or it turns out to be utterly destructive. Written at the end of World War I, Aaron's Rod is the most radical attempt to question and lay bare the Angst of losing oneself in a heterosexual relationship and to find escape from personal and social entrapment in a homosexual one, which, throughout the novel, is felt as necessary and potential, but left hanging in a vacuum, reduced to unfulfilling verbal communication. In spite of the protagonist's nihilistic attitude, the heterosexual relationship is experienced as a potential danger created by the woman, which man is unable to resist, but which is responsible for his own personal loss and inner destruction (even before adventuring into it).
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