Life with a Capital L: Essays Chosen and Introduced by Geoff Dyer By D.H. Lawrence

review Life with a Capital L: Essays Chosen and Introduced by Geoff Dyer

Published in Penguin's A format series, which includes works by Susan Sontag and John Berger, this will appeal to anyone who enjoys cultural criticism Life with a Capital L: Essays Chosen and Introduced by Geoff Dyer

Often he's just skipping along through life trying to be a nice guy, sometimes he descends into manic wild-haired ravings - it's not always sensible but he's grappling with more than most can even imagine. D.H. Lawrence i’m glad the essays were put in chronological order because you could totally see Lawrence’s development as a writer. The later essays were WAYYYYY better!! I was very disappointed by the Thomas Hardy essay tho :/ D.H. Lawrence Dyer and Lawrence are an odd pairing. Lawrence was often clumsy and prolix, especially when gripped by one of his never-ending theories. But his goal was to break the print barrier and feel his way inside others - a fox, a snake, a porcupine, men, women, miners, pit owners, drinkers, workers, idlers, lovers, and (especially) flowers. Lawrence at his best makes the real world seem drab by comparison.

Dyer, on the other hand, is a deeply secondary writer and ‘post-modern’ to his ball-hairs. He writes studies about other writers, fails, then passes off the result as something ingenious. His novels are often based on someone else’s work (including the pissing awful Jeff in Venice). He doesn’t aspire to write the ‘great bright book of life’ but a smarmy introduction to it.

Mercifully, here his energy goes into something else: the best of Lawrence’s shorter pieces, sometimes intact, sometimes snipped off larger works. The travel books occupy a satisfying portion of the text, and even part of a batch review is used cleverly. The book that seizes his attention is a slim book of vignettes by an unknown American named Ernest Hemingway. An essay about Nottingham and its coal miners is a truthful, beautiful piece, and should twit many a lazy stereotype about miners as unfeeling or artless.

My one gripe is that Dyer doesn’t quote more from Twilight in Italy, ‘The Lemon Gardens’ chapter in particular. D.H. Lawrence Reading this book was an ordeal; these Lawrence's essays reminded me of the same snobbery and pedantry I found in Thoreau's Walden - definitely not my cup of tea. D.H. Lawrence