Sofa So Good: On the Art of Fingering the Furniture (With Reference to D. H. Lawrence's 'The Thimble')

Clifford Hall: Portrait of a Reclining Lady 

(Oil on canvas 48.5 x 59 cm)

 

 

I. 

 

Many people have had sex on a sofa. But only a few establish an erotic relationship with their sofa in the manner of the unnamed 27-year-old woman in D. H. Lawrence's short story 'The Thimble' [a].

 

Usually, the passage in which the woman fondles her sofa, pushing her fingers deep inside, is interpreted as a sign of her sexual frustration and/or unfulfilled sexual desire. And, to be fair, it's true that she hadn't seen her husband for many months - "not since her fortnight's honeymoon with him, and his departure for France" [190] - so perhaps she does have a certain pent up passion.

 

But I like to think that since the honeymoon and his going off to fight, the woman who had "lived and died and come to life again" [190], had also reconfigured her sexuality in a queer new fashion. In other words, I prefer to read Lawrence's text not in terms of what Judith Ruderman calls symbolic masturbation [b], but as an interesting case of objectophilia ...

 

 

II. 

 

It's clear from the beginning of the story that the woman likes nice things. And, although apparently short of money, after renting a small flat in Mayfair - an affluent, upper-class area of London then as now - she fills it with suitable furniture. Only when she has made the flat complete and perfect and is surrounded by many alluring objects, is she satisfied.   

 

Human love, in comparison, has never quite done the trick; she has always remained at some level alone and untouched. And as she awaits the return of her (badly disfigured) husband, she feels a certain cold anxiety. 

 

It's only by putting on her favourite black silk dress and her jewellery that she can feel safe and secure; protected, as it were, by her own finery and fashionable beauty. And it's only by moving her hands "slowly backwards and forwards on the sofa" [194] that she can begin to unwind; "as if the friction of the silk gave her some ease" [194].    

 

But she doesn't stop with simply sliding her hands across the surface of the sofa; she soon progresses to the far more intimate act of digital penetration:

 

"Her right hand came to the end of the sofa and pressed a little into the crack, the meeting between the arm and the sofa bed. Her long white fingers pressed into the fissure, pressed and entered rhythmically, pressed and pressed further and further into the tight depths of the fissure, between the silken, firm upholstery of the old sofa, whilst her mind was in a trance of suspense [...]

      The working, slow, intent fingers pressed deeper and deeper in the fissure of the sofa, pressed and worked their way intently [...] they worked all along, very gradually, along the tight depth of the fissure." [194]

    

In this extraordinary passage, Lawrence gives the practice of couch sex a perverse new twist and makes searching down the back of the settee for loose change (or, as in this case, an old thimble) now seem far less innocent [c].    

 

 

Notes

 

[a] D. H. Lawrence, 'The Thimble', in England, My England and Other Stories, ed. Bruce Steele, (Cambridge University Press, 1990), pp. 190-200. All page references given in the post refer to this edition.

      Lawrence wrote 'The Thimble' in October 1915 and it was first published in the American literary magazine Seven Arts (March 1917). The sofa-loving woman, Mrs Hepburn, was based on Lady Cynthia Asquith (large feet and all). 

      As the Japanese Lawrence scholar Gaku Iwai points out in the essay cited below, very few critics pay 'The Thimble' much attention - and, to be fair, even Lawrence grew to dislike it, telling his bibliographer Edward McDonald in 1924 that he would "rather like 'The Thimble' to disappear into oblivion" (see Letters V 104). By this date he had, of course, radically revised and extended the tale into the far better known novella The Ladybird (1921).

      See: Gaku Iwai, 'Wartime Ideology in "The Thimble": A Comparative Study of Popular Wartime Romance and the Anti-romance of D. H. Lawrence', Études Lawrenciennes, 46  (2015): click here to read online.   

 

[b] Judith Ruderman, D. H. Lawrence and the Devouring Mother, (Duke University Press, 1984), p. 76.

 

[c] Readers should note that the story doesn't end here, even if the post does. Lawrence ultimately has to reaffirm the love of man and woman - his whole sexual metaphysic is based on such - thus Mr and Mrs Hepburn are reconciled and reborn into a new life of co-dependence and mutual desire, he throwing the thimble she found "embedded in the depths of the sofa-crack" [194] out of the window.  

 

 

Finally, those who have enjoyed this post might find an earlier post in which I discuss Stéphane Sitayeb's essay on sexualized objects in Lawrence’s short fiction of interest: click here.        

D. H. Lawrence: The Reluctant Fashion Beast

 D. H. Lawrence in 1915 modelling his Edwardian 

hipster look complete with velveteen jacket

 National Portrait Gallery, London 

(NPG x140423)

 

I.

 

The Edinburgh Companion to D. H. Lawrence and the Arts (2020) is a big, heavy hardback book - over 440 pages divided between 28 essays, written by 27 different authors - so pretty much impossible to read from start to finish. 

 

Thus, once having read the Introduction, one begins to cruise the text, searching out those essays and those authors most likely to give pleasure. Let's begin with Judith Ruderman's essay on the importance in Lawrence's work of clothing and jewellery (though note that I'll not be discussing the latter here) ...

 

 

II.

 

Ruderman says that Lawrence's views on fashion are complex (sometimes contradictory) and often need to be discussed in relation to his other concerns to do with art, sex, and society. That's certainly true. In fact, it could be argued that the Lawrentian call for a revaluation of all values is founded upon a revolt into style: "Start with externals, and proceed to internals" [1], as he puts it. 

 

Unfortunately, however, this statement merely reveals Lawrence's metaphysical naivety. For there are no internals to which we might proceed and outer form or appearance is not expressive of inner essence or substance; things have no concealed reality. The secret of life revealed by dandyism - conceived by Foucault as a critical ontology and philosophical ethos beyond the dualism of inside/outside - is that it has no secret.

 

Thus, what's ironic - Ruderman's word - is not that "an author infamous for having his characters shed their clothes actually paid a great deal of close attention to what they are wearing" [2], but that an author who cared so much about fashion seems not to have grasped its deconstructive  logic. 

 

Strolling along the Strand in brave feathers - which for Lawrence means wearing "tight scarlet trousers fitting the leg, gay little orange-brown jackets and bright green hats" [3] - isn't simply to defy dreary social convention and sartorial dullness, it's to declare that one is Greek in the Nietzschean sense - i.e.,  superficial out of profundity [4].

 

Another thing that Ruderman highlights is Lawrence's fascination for strikingly colourful clothing. And it's true, he did favour fabulous - some might say garish - colour combinations in his battle against the drabness of those he calls the grey ones. And whilst I'd probably feel a little uncomfortable in some of the gay outfits Lawrence proposes, they would certainly have delighted Oscar Wilde, who wrote:

 

"There would be more joy in life if we could accustom ourselves to use all the beautiful colours we can fashioning our own clothes. The dress of the future, I think, will [...] abound with joyous colour.” [5]

 

Maybe, Oscar, maybe ... Though as all fashionistas and "naturally exquisite people" [6] - from Mrs Morel to Coco Chanel - know, ultimately, there's nowhere to go but back to black, which paradoxically, is the negation of all colour whilst also the most vital of colours. Sometimes, even Lawrence comes close to admitting this, when, for example, he talks of dark gods and the invisible black sun. 

 

But, push comes to shove, when it comes to clothes, Lawrence prefers sensible blues and browns and home-knit socks. What's more, he often sneers at truly fashionable people (who frighten and repulse him), openly disparaging haute couture. As Ruderman reminds us, although like other modernist writers he was happy to have his pieces published in Vogue, "being 'smart' in the Vogue sense was anathema to him" [7] - full of what he described as the vanity of the ego.      

 

That's why, despite his fetishistic fascination with clothes - particularly stockings - I think we can characterise Lawrence as a reluctant fashion beast or closeted dandy; one who is slightly ashamed of his own love for and knowledge of clothes and who regards those who always dress to impress as affected and a bit show-offy [8]. 

 

Ruderman concludes: 

"Fashion for Lawrence is best adopted as a hallmark of transformation and revitalisation: not for the sake of impressing others, but, rather, for expressing the self at any given moment in time. [...] As a 'rare bird' among men [...] Lawrence appreciated fashion, but with caveats and contradictions. That Lawrence's attitudes towards this subject are complex and evocative only highlights how they are intricately woven into the fabric of the life and art of a very complicated man." [9]

I agree with that and would only add that Lawrence's appreciation of fashion isn't all that rare amongst male writers; indeed, some of the most insightful meditations on clothes have come from our poets, novelists, and philosophers - from Baudelaire to Roland Barthes. Even Kant, when mocked for wearing silver-buckled shoes, replied: Better to be a fool in fashion, than a fool out of fashion ...  

 

 

Notes

 

[1] D. H. Lawrence, 'Red Trousers', in Late Essays and Articles, ed. James T. Boulton, (Cambridge University Press, 2004), p. 138.  

[2] Judith Ruderman, 'Clothes and Jewellery', The Edinburgh Companion to D. H. Lawrence, ed. Catherine Brown and Susan Reid, (Edinburgh University Press, 2020), p. 371.

[3] D. H. Lawrence, 'Red Trousers', Late Essays and Articles, p. 138. 

[4] See section 4 of the preface to the second edition of Nietzsche's The Gay Science. For Nietzsche, living courageously in the Greek manner requires remaining at the surface at the level of folds, adoring appearance, believing in forms, etc.

      Of course, the desire to become-Greek isn't the only logic of fashion; it is also motivated by the desire to become new (to constantly change one's look). To his great credit, Kant realised that fashion has nothing to do with aesthetic criteria (i.e. that it's not a striving after beauty); in this respect his writings on fashion are rather more modern than those of Baudelaire.

      The key point is that fashion seeks to make an object superfluous as quickly as possible. It does not seek to improve an object, which is why there is no ideal of progress within the world of fashion; a short skirt is not an advance on a long one. As Norwegian philosopher Lars Svendsen writes: "Fashion does not have any telos, any final purpose, in the sense of striving for a state of perfection [...] The aim of fashion is rather to be potentially endless, that is it creates new forms and constellations ad infinitum." See Fashion: A Philosophy, trans. John Irons, (Reaktion Books, 2006), p. 29.  

[5] Oscar Wilde, 'The House Beautiful', in the Complete Works of Oscar Wilde, (Harper Collins, 1994), p. 923. 

[6] D. H. Lawrence, Sons and Lovers, ed. Helen Baron and Carl Baron, (Cambridge University Press, 1992), p. 151. Quoted by Judith Ruderman, op. cit., p. 371.

 

[7] Judith Ruderman, op. cit., 377.

 

[8] As Ruderman reminds us, in 'Education of the People' Lawrence sneers at the modern woman who follows fashion and "wants to look ultra-smart and chic beyond words", creating an effect on those around her. See D. H. Lawrence, 'Education of the People', in Reflections on the Death of a Porcupine and Other Essays, ed. Michael Herbert, (Cambridge University Press, 1988), p. 152. Quoted by Ruderman, op. cit., p. 381. 

 

[9] Judith Ruderman, op. cit., pp. 381-82.  

On Learning to Laugh at Everything with Larry David, Georges Bataille and D. H. Lawrence

Credit: durantelallera/Shutterstock

I. Everything's Funny

As I said in a recent post, one of the things that the phrase torpedo the ark means to me is having the freedom to criticise everything under the sun - even if that risks offending others. Nothing is sacrosanct or off limits; everything can be targeted and everything can be ridiculed, mocked, or poked fun at because, as Larry David rightly informs his friend Richard Lewis, everything's funny - even the death of a beloved parakeet.*

Here, I'd like to expand on this idea with reference to the work of Georges Bataille and D. H. Lawrence ...

II. A Philosophy of Laughter

Bataille discovered the importance of laughter very early on in his career as a writer.

It wasn't, however, until a lecture made many years later, in 1953, that he was able to admit with a smile that, insofar as he'd been engaged in serious philosophical work at all, he'd been constructing a philosophy founded upon (and exclusively concerned with) the experience of laughter as that which escapes reason and understanding.    

In other words, it's not just the unknown or unknowable that causes us to laugh; laughter is itself inexplicable and we often have no idea why we laugh when we do - joy bubbles over or bursts forth unexpectedly and as a form of excess (or what Bataille terms unproductive expenditure).

And - crucially, from the perspective of ethics - laughter is often infectious; when we laugh, others laugh too. Indeed, whilst it's perfectly possible to weep alone, I'm not sure one can ever really laugh in isolation (without being a madman). It's laughter - not sorrow (or mourning) - that is the social practice par excellence.     

But what, for Bataille, is there to laugh at?

The answer, as for Larry David, is everything: Bataille encourages us to laugh not just at the world and the things that are in it, but at being itself and, ultimately, at that which all being is a being towards: death. This is clear in his short poem entitled 'Laughter' [Rire]:

Laugh and laugh
at the sun
at the nettles
at the stones
at the ducks

at the rain
at the pee-pee of the pope
at mummy
at a coffin full of shit

Commenting on the above verse, Nick Land writes:

"It is because life is pure surplus that the child of Rire - standing by the side of his quietly weeping mother and transfixed by the stinking ruins of his father - is gripped by convulsions of horror that explode into peals of mirth, as uncompromising as orgasm. [...] Laughter is a communion with the dead, since death is not the object of laughter: it is death itself that finds a voice when we laugh. Laughter is that which is lost to discourse, the haemorrhaging of pragmatics into excitation and filth."

Ba-dum-tsh!

III. Curb Your Enthusiasm

D. H. Lawrence is another writer who makes an important contribution to the philosophy of laughter - perhaps surprisingly so, as this self-styled priest of love is thought by many to be utterly humourless, though often unintentionally comic or absurd.   

However, as Judith Ruderman points out, the mistaken idea that Lawrence had no sense of humour is an opinion held for the most part by those who are misled (or disconcereted) by his intensity. He is often over-earnest and can sometimes be a bore. But Lawrence also values (and utilises) humour in his work, often deliberately undermining his own seriousness and tendency to preach.    

Ruderman also reminds us of this crucial passage written by Lawrence in his essay on Edgar Allan Poe (a passage that LD would surely approve of): 

"The Holy Ghost bids us never to be too deadly in our earnestness, always to laugh in time, at ourselves and at everything. Particularly at our sublimities. Everything has its hour of ridicule - everything."

The Holy Ghost, according to Lawrence, also helps us to keep it real; "not to push our cravings too far, not to submit to stunts and high falutin, above all not to be too egoistic and willful [...] to leave off when it bids us leave off".

In other words, the Holy Ghost helps us curb our enthusiasm and recognise that the latter - particularly when tied to moral and ideological fundamentalism - is what threatens us today.

Notes

*I refer here to a scene in the first episode of the ninth season of Curb Your Enthusiasm entitled 'Foisted!', dir. Jeff Schaffer, written by Larry David and Jeff Schaffer (2017): click here.

Bataille, 'Nonknowledge, Laughter, and Tears', in The Unfinished System of Nonknowledge, ed. Stuart Kendall, trans. Michelle Kendall and Stuart Kendall, (University of Minnesota, 2001). 

Nick Land, The Thirst for Annihilation: Georges Bataille and Virulent Nihilism, (Routledge 1992), p. xvii. The translation of the poem is also found here. 

Judith Ruderman, 'D. H. Lawrence on Trial Yet Again: The Charge? It's Ridiculous!', Journal of D. H. Lawrence Studies, ed. Susan Reid, Vol. 5, Number 1, (2018), pp. 59-82.

D. H. Lawrence, 'Edgar Allan Poe', Studies in Classic American Literature, ed. Ezra Greenspan, Lindeth Vasey and John Worthen, (Cambridge University Press, 2003), p. 73.