Sex isn't sin, says D. H. Lawrence, not until the conscious mind creeps in and sheer physical intensity is exchanged for pornographic representation. In other words, for Lawrence, the fall of man is always a fall into idealism; an ontological crisis that prevents sex from ebbing and flowing according to its own natural rhythm within the mysterious depths of the body and results in the mental exploitation of Dasein's mortal reserves of being.
Thus, I'm pretty sure that Lawrence wouldn't be very amused by the idea of sapiosexuality - a term increasingly popular on social networking sites - although it's interesting to recall that in his late work he did call for the full conscious realisation of sex, claiming that this was, today, even more important than fucking itself.
This wasn't, however, a dramatic and surprising U-turn on his part. Rather, it indicates how, in the Chatterley writings, Lawrence came to the conclusion that in order to save sex from the rape of the itching mind we had first to discover the vital truth that there are some things it's best not to know; that too much knowledge can in fact be fatal.
This wasn't, however, a dramatic and surprising U-turn on his part. Rather, it indicates how, in the Chatterley writings, Lawrence came to the conclusion that in order to save sex from the rape of the itching mind we had first to discover the vital truth that there are some things it's best not to know; that too much knowledge can in fact be fatal.
But, of course, what does any of this matter to anyone who isn't a Lawrentian?
I very much doubt that the writings of a poet and novelist who died 88 years ago today have much hold over the thinking of non-binary millennials, keen to explore and proliferate models of queer sexuality and challenge the dualism inherent in out-dated thinking on the mind/body question, as if these two things were categorically separate and, indeed, forever locked in metaphysical opposition.
I can perfectly understand why some people might find grey matter sexy and be aroused by the intelligence of others. Having said that, I'm extremely wary of nymphobrainiacs who claim to have no concern with looks and puritanically dismiss those who still maintain a fondness for aesthetically pleasing gendered bodies as superficial heterosexist meat lovers.
I very much doubt that the writings of a poet and novelist who died 88 years ago today have much hold over the thinking of non-binary millennials, keen to explore and proliferate models of queer sexuality and challenge the dualism inherent in out-dated thinking on the mind/body question, as if these two things were categorically separate and, indeed, forever locked in metaphysical opposition.
I can perfectly understand why some people might find grey matter sexy and be aroused by the intelligence of others. Having said that, I'm extremely wary of nymphobrainiacs who claim to have no concern with looks and puritanically dismiss those who still maintain a fondness for aesthetically pleasing gendered bodies as superficial heterosexist meat lovers.
Why is it that so many people who subscribe to alternative lifestyles and/or neo-sexualities act so smug and morally superior?
So what if some people are attracted to the appearance of intelligence, rather than individuals who genuinely possess high IQs and Ph.Ds? Are those turned on by models or actors posing as geeks in glasses, for example, in someway inferior to those who get excited discussing real books and complex ideas with actual librarians, teachers, or science graduates?
Ultimately, as a philosopher, I suspect that sapiosexuality is just another form of ascetic idealism and just another ruse that keeps us subject to what Foucault terms the austere monarchy of sex, so that we spend our lives constructing identities and various rights upon a ridiculous (and nostalgic) fiction.
The dispersion of sexualities and implantation of perversions that began in the 19th century, ran throughout the 20th, continues still, today, in the 21st. Soon, sapiosexuals will be as familiar and as acceptable as homosexuals, for example, and sapiosexuality will be conceived not in Lawrentian terms as a form of sinful sex-in-the-head - nor simply as a slightly unusual basis on which to select a partner - but expressive of a singular nature or essential self.
Perhaps one day, as Foucault says, when we live within a different economy of bodies and pleasures, people will wonder at such stupidity and smile at our belief that in this most sacred of all things - sex - lay a truth every bit as precious as those we have already extracted from the material universe and the purest forms of our thought.
We're a long way from Wuthering Heights - but we still have a long way to go ...
The dispersion of sexualities and implantation of perversions that began in the 19th century, ran throughout the 20th, continues still, today, in the 21st. Soon, sapiosexuals will be as familiar and as acceptable as homosexuals, for example, and sapiosexuality will be conceived not in Lawrentian terms as a form of sinful sex-in-the-head - nor simply as a slightly unusual basis on which to select a partner - but expressive of a singular nature or essential self.
Perhaps one day, as Foucault says, when we live within a different economy of bodies and pleasures, people will wonder at such stupidity and smile at our belief that in this most sacred of all things - sex - lay a truth every bit as precious as those we have already extracted from the material universe and the purest forms of our thought.
We're a long way from Wuthering Heights - but we still have a long way to go ...
See:
D. H. Lawrence, 'Sex Isn't Sin', The Poems, ed. Christopher Pollnitz, (Cambridge University Press, 2013).
D. H. Lawrence, A Propos of 'Lady Chatterley's Lover' and Other Essays, (Penguin Books, 1962).
Michel Foucault, The History of Sexuality 1: The Will to Knowledge, trans. Robert Hurley, (Penguin Books, 1998).
D. H. Lawrence, 'Sex Isn't Sin', The Poems, ed. Christopher Pollnitz, (Cambridge University Press, 2013).
D. H. Lawrence, A Propos of 'Lady Chatterley's Lover' and Other Essays, (Penguin Books, 1962).
Michel Foucault, The History of Sexuality 1: The Will to Knowledge, trans. Robert Hurley, (Penguin Books, 1998).
Thanks to Kiranjit Kaur for inspiring this post.
This gives a lovely little glimpse into a great big subject, and is so timely, 88 years to the day since Lawrence died at 44.
ReplyDeleteLawrence, of course, put it so beautifully simply; that there's no such thing as sin - only life and anti-life.
Those who are sensitively tuned in to Lawrence, and who revel in life, can soon spot anti-life sins - and associated sinners!
On a Gnostic reading, the serpent-seduced fall in the Garden (aided and abetted by Woman) is actually, to borrow from Heidegger, a fall into the height, i.e. a soaring into (self-)consciousness and psychic awakening. This new vision is what is meant by the opening of the divine couple's eyes. As such, the discovery of shame signifies the crossing of a threshold out of mere animality into what might be thought of as the (fer)mentation of sexuality as something now covered and clothed, because consciously experienced as sacred for the first time.
ReplyDeleteAs for sex, intelligence and the body, we might think of Nietzsche's neglected (albeit gendered) aphorism that 'the degree and kind of a man's sexuality reach up into the ultimate pinnacle of his spirit'.
We might well be far from Wuthering Heights, but we're also not nearly close enough!
Ditto on Wuthering Heights ... couldn't have put it better!
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