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Burning Man: The Trials of D. H. Lawrence
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About This Book
An electrifying, revelatory new biography of D. H. Lawrence, with a focus on his difficult middle years "Never trust the teller," wrote D. H. Lawrence, "trust the tale." Everyone who knew him told stories about Lawrence, and Lawrence told stories about everyone he knew. He also told stories about himself, again and again: a pioneer of autofiction, no writer before Lawrence had made so permeable the border between life and literature. In Burning Man: The Trials of D. H. Lawrence, acclaimed biographer Frances Wilson tells a new story about the author, focusing on his decade of superhuman writing and travel between 1915, when The Rainbow was suppressed following an obscenity trial, and 1925, when he was diagnosed with tuberculosis. Taking after Lawrence's own literary model, Dante, and adopting the structure of The Divine Comedy, Burning Man is a distinctly Lawrentian book, one that pursues Lawrence around the globe and reflects his life of wild allegory. Eschewing the confines of traditional biography, it offers a triptych of lesser-known episodes drawn from lesser-known sources, including tales of Lawrence as told by his friends in letters, memoirs, and diaries. Focusing on three turning points in Lawrence's pilgrimage (his crises in Cornwall, Italy, and New Mexico) and three central adversaries--his wife, Frieda; the writer Maurice Magnus; and his patron, Mabel Dodge Luhan--Wilson uncovers a lesser-known Lawrence, both as a writer and as a man. Strikingly original, superbly researched, and always revelatory, Burning Man is a marvel of iconoclastic biography. With flair and focus, Wilson unleashes a distinct perspective on one of history's most beloved and infamous writers.
Reviews
"But this tendency to break him down risks overlooking another thing clear from Wilson's biography: that Lawrence was a great synthesiser ..."
"Wilson's Dantesque excursion detracts only marginally from the brilliance of her book."
"Lawrence was unpredictable and unconventional enough to be often frustrating to those around him but fascinating to the rest of us, who may observe his antics at a safe distance."
"Wilson's narrative lays bare the fascinating struggle between Lawrence's two selves: one peaceful and spiritual, another which fantasises about shooting everyone he sees 'with invisible arrows of death'."
"By invoking the idea of so providential and strongly predetermined a narrative Wilson manages to convey very successfully, by contrast, the haplessness of Lawrence's itinerant life: she is good throughout on his inability to stay still ..."
"The best biographers appreciate trivia, too."
"A distinctly original perspective on an iconic writer."
"One of the most compelling parts of Burning Man is Wilson's appreciation for Lawrence's out-of-print memoir of his friend Maurice Magnus."
"She is in some ways a Lawrentian-styled explicator of Lawrence ..."
"Wilson creates a fascinating portrait of Lawrence from his childhood in the coal fields of Nottingham to his prolific drive to write ..."
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