The English Patient (a.k.a. Patience)

This week has been one of triumph and torment at the hands of a treacherous adversary - the English literature essay. I now realize that this description is somewhat flawed, since my essay doesn't actually have hands - or limbs of any sort - but you get the general idea...

The torment began a few weeks ago, when I read D.H. Lawrence's "Sons and Lovers". It's a Modernist novel, which basically means that it's the type of literature which likes asking thought-provoking questions and then leaving them unanswered. Nihilism is the order of the day - in 400 pages, nothing really happens, and the novel prides itself on this emptiness. That might be a bit of an exaggeration though - "stuff" does happen in the book. The main character's parents meet and get married. They live happily for 6 months. Then, he starts drinking and wasting money and she starts trying to make him a better person. They argue for 20 years, but manage to have 4 children during this time (so they can't dislike each other that much). One of these children is the delightful Paul - possibly the first book character that I've ever wanted to slap. Lawrence's claim to fame with this novel is that it was considered rather outrageous at the time, because he explored the concepts of sex and sexuality. There's nothing particularly graphic in the novel, but the fact that Paul sleeps with not 1, but 2 women, was deemed particularly transgressive when Lawrence wrote the novel at the start of the 1900's. Not only does he sleep with these 2 women - Miriam, who is an extremely chaste religious girl, and Clara, a divorcee (even more scandal...) - but (horror of horrors!) he doesn't marry either of them! *gasp* Paul's approach to sexual relations isn't what gets to me. I have no problem with him deflowering the local maidens. What did drive me nuts though was the fact that he is a girl. Not in the biological sense, but in the way he complains about everything to his mother! Basically, when his mom asks him why he refuses to marry, he complains about how he loves the girl in some ways but not others, how he doesn't love the girl, how the girl loves him too much, how he loves the girl too much.... You get the idea. He's really whiny and annoying, and the fact that he complains to his mom about these women drives me mad.

In any case, I read the novel, and received my essay topics from my delightful lecturer, Tim Trengrove-Jones. He is convinced that it is the greatest novel ever written. No comment. So, this week, I started pondering what to write, and picked a topic which looked at gender relations in the novel. I wasn't looking forward to the essay, but it needed to be written. And lo and behold, it went really well. I found tons of stuff to write about - and good stuff too (not "Paul is a whiny mommy's boy" type stuff) - and lots of journal articles to back up what I'd written. I wrote 3000 words and I'm quite chuffed, although it turned into a battle, because I had TOO much to say! Serious editing was required, because I ran out of time! I also discovered that, having avoided the "Paul's sexual confusion" narrative, the story of his parents' relationship wasn't half bad, and I have become quite intrigued by it. The essay has been handed in, and I'm now waiting in anticipation for Tim's judgment...

That essay was a bit of a battle, but not nearly as much as the one I wrote for "The Picture of Dorian Gray". I had very little time to write it, finished it the night before and really doubted that I had said anything of value in 2000 words. Oscar Wilde is very difficult - I couldn't tell if he was revelling in intellectualism and decadence and being over the top, or making a statement about how silly people who are intellectual and decadent are. The whole book goes around and around and comes out... nowhere. And I was pretty sure that my essay was much the same. Until I got it back this week. And this is where the triumph part comes in - I got a first! *gasp* I am a little confused, because the essay was very confused, but Tim seemed to like it. My only other conclusion is that he was just as confused, but felt that I must have said something deep and meaningful somewhere and just gave me the mark. I'm not sure... Either way, I'm relieved. It just makes me wonder what my mark on the second essay will be, considering that I thought that it was well-written and researched. I will laugh if I get a better mark on the Oscar Wilde essay than on the Lawrence one. I will then know that my mark is directly proportional to whether or not my marker ate yoghurt for breakfast, which is how I've always suspected Tim marks... I guess I'll wait and see...