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Review commentary by Jeremy Wilson on Lawrence,
the Uncrowned King of Arabia by Michael Asher (London, Viking, 1998)
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Chapter 2: Dominus Illuminatio Mea
Schooldays, 1896-1905 (10 pages)
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| 26/2/1 |
At
this point Asher
tries to link his conclusions in this chapter with those in the
first, in yet another wholly unsupported statement: "Lawrence's
sensitive traits grew out of the deep imprint of his mother's
personality." Really? |
| 26/2/2
et seq. |
Asher
goes on to develop his case that Lawrence was homosexual - a case which,
remember, has failed all the tests thus far. He writes that Lawrence
"had a great capacity for friendship with both men and women. His
most profound ties would be with other men, and according to Arnie,
these friendships "were comparable in intensity to sexual love, for
which he made them a substitute".
The words used in the quotation are correct (though in this
case the order of the close-quote and full-stop is again wrong, since
this is the end of a sentence in the original. Do Viking employ
copy-editors?). However, the use of the quote again displays Asher's
lack of intellectual integrity. In the original, A. W. Lawrence did not
specify, as Asher clearly implies here ("these
friendships"), that he is talking only about Lawrence's friendships
with men.
Furthermore, when writing in Friends, A. W. Lawrence
was considering the full range of his brother's friendships (about which more anon). By contrast, this second chapter in
Asher's book purports to deal with Lawrence's development between the
ages of 8 and 17. It is extremely unlikely that A. W. Lawrence had any
relationship from that period in mind when he wrote those words. |
| 26/2/7 |
Having
characterised Lawrence's friendships in such a manner, and on such good
authority, Asher goes on to transfer the implications to one
particular relationship, with Leonard Green, who was certainly not
Lawrence's closest friend during that period. In fact, the evidence
suggests that, at this or any other period, Green could more accurately
be described as an acquaintance than a friend.
Green was three years older than Lawrence, and was an
undergraduate friend of Lawrence's elder brother Bob (both were at St.
John's College). In Green's brief contribution to Friends (pages
67-9) only the first two paragraphs refer to Lawrence's schooldays, and
the second of these merely repeats general information about the
Lawrence family. There is nothing in either paragraph to suggest that
Lawrence knew Green well at that period. In the third paragraph, Green
writes "The next impression is of Lawrence after his first visit to
Syria" - i.e. in 1909, at the end of Lawrence's second year at
university, and outside the scope of this chapter.
However, Green is more useful to Asher here than the people
who really were Lawrence's school-friends: Beeson, Chaundy, and Hall -
all contributors to Friends. Why? Because we know (from a source
unconnected with Lawrence) that Green was homosexual.
In this section Asher draws heavily on The Golden
Warrier by Lawrence James, who also cites the friendship with Green.
James in turn drew much of this from the earlier biography by Desmond
Stewart (T. E. Lawrence, London, Hamish Hamilton, 1977). Although
the fact was not widely known when his book was published, Stewart was himself openly homosexual. His book - which
contains much innuendo, factual error, and debatable argument - goes to
some length to portray Lawrence as homosexual also. I do not think that
this conclusion is justified by the evidence that Stewart presents. (Continued
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