Appropriately sepia-ish, The Seven Pillars of Wisdom is nearly finished, literally. I killed it. It was badly bound. So the middle has fallen out. I've been watching the David Lean film as well as a later BBC one with Ralph Fiennes, pacing myself so that the movie-action doesn't overtake the book's. And the book I've been taking in small bites, to last: each bite is desert, sand, rocks, some thorn tree, camels and silk. He writes about landscape more evocatively than I have seen it filmed. Perhaps because it is page upon page of minute observation by a man whose genius was perception and its communication. I have a feeling now for the desert of Arabia that I could never have imagined, before. He was in love, and saw, and recorded, everything.It is interesting how the film epic is a telescoping of the book, a creation, not true. Peter O'Toole was actually brilliant, apart from the hair gel.
I will never transcribe the threatened lamb-feast; I promised more than I am willing to deliver. It must be read. If you buy the badly-bound Anchor Books edition it is on Pages 265 -268. Nevermind the tribes, all the names, all the logistical back and forths - this is really the most remarkable way of becoming immersed in something utterly foreign. Apart from landscape, his pictures of men (never women, there are none in his eyes) are extraordinary, and toward the end of the book there is a six page self-analysis on the occasion of his 30th birthday, which is riveting. And his views on women. Well. I think he must have had a baaaaad experience:
"The lower creation I avoided, as a reflection upon our failure to attain real intellectuality. If they forced themselves on me I hated them. To put my hand on a living thing was defilement; and it made me tremble if they touched me or took too quick an interest in me. This was an atomic repulsion...I had a longing for the absolutism of women and animals, and lamented myself most when I saw a soldier with a girl, or a man fondling a dog, because my wish was to be as superficial, as perfected; and my jailer held me back."
Hm. Maybe he didn't hate them. He hated himself?
Hmm, you're giving me mixed signals about that book. I kinda want to read it, and I kinda don't. I'd love the landscape descriptions, I'm sure, but does it talk about paragliding at all??? ;-)
ReplyDeleteGoody! Another book, another journey - thanks Marie. Will report back after reading it. An odd man, but aren't we all odd?
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ReplyDeleteRats. (Not directed at either of you): Glitches.
ReplyDeleteVince, if you read about 500 pages there are three wonderful chapters about a pilot called Junor, who does heroic things in a clapped- out little plane against the Turks. I was almost jumping up and down and cheering.
Jay - it's so nice to see you here. In your honour I tried to upload a video of my dad which I unearthed, from last Christmas, which I thought might crack you up, since he seems to be a source of endless entertainment to you...Chris will help me sort it out today. It's short, it's bad quality...but well, you'll see.
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