"Blue Bird Symbolizing Happiness", originally a play title created by Belgian dramatist Maeterlinck, tells the story of a young man and woman who went through hardships to find the blue bird symbolizing happiness. But the famous British writer Lawrence tells people a completely different story in his little-known short story "Two Qingwu" - two women fight for a man, and even more incredible is that The protagonists of the story are based on Lawrence and his wife Freda and Dorothy Bright, a woman whom Lawrence uses as a buffer between him and Freda.
In real life, Lawrence's success is inseparable from women, such as: his mother Lydia, who had the most influence on his life, his wife Freda, who eloped with him and accompanied him to the last moment of his life for him, and He has Jesse with undying loyalty and friendship, Mabel who generously gave his ranch to him, Brett, a woman willing to act as a buffer between him and his wife, and so on, and Lawrence's novel Almost all of them are created with women as protagonists. It can be said that without women, there would be no Lawrence's great success. Many of these women have become an important part of his life and creation, and Lawrence uses his own fine brush to show the experiences that live around him and become a part of his life through his works. Many characters in real life have become immortal images in his literary works. Understanding the stories of Lawrence and the women around him in real life is of great help to better understand his creative ideas and the connotations of his works.
The story of Freda, who was six years older than Lawrence and eloped with him for love, is well known, but little is known about Dorothy Bright, who lived between them. Bright was the daughter of Viscount Ethel and a rebel of a nobleman. She grew up in an unfortunate family. She had a gay father who married for face. Her mother died when she was young. She could not get the love of her father, and was threatened by her brothers. Growing up in fear, she has always refused to marry. She later studied painting at the Reston School of Fine Arts and became a painter. Wearing hearing aids wherever she goes due to her hearing impairment, Lawrence "has always carried Brett with her as a buffer between him and Freda". She followed the Lawrences from Europe to Taos, New Mexico, and then to Mexico. "They were a group of three most of the time, and when Brett and Lawrence left Freda behind to visit British friends in Hawajaca, to paint or discuss printing of his work, the two of them became Got a couple." This made Freda very angry. Lawrence's description of Bright was: "Sometimes like a bird, sometimes like a squirrel, sometimes like a rabbit, but never like a woman." Despite all of Bright's weaknesses. But nothing could stop her from falling in love. She is madly in love with Lawrence, although she herself believes that her love for Lawrence is not erotic, but due to the vision of Lawrence's ideal life. Although Brett likes Lawrence and does everything he can to help him faithfully, he doesn't like Lawrence's wife Freda. As a result, the two women often point fingers at each other, so much so that Freda eventually asks Lawrence to kick Bright off. These life experiences are artistically projected onto the characters in Two Blue Birds by Lawrence. The novel begins as follows:
There is a woman who loves her husband very much, but cannot share a room with him; the husband also loves his wife so much that he cannot share a room with her. Both of them were under forty years old, and they both looked very talented. They were genuinely in love and somehow felt that they would grow old together. They know each other better than they know each other: the two of them are close to each other, and they know each other better than others. However, they cannot get along day and night, and they are always separated by thousands of miles. As he sat in the shadows of England, out of an unrelenting loyalty, in the depths of his heart he always remembered his wife: she had an indescribable thirst for fidelity, and she sought pleasure in the southern sun. And she, as she sat on the seaside deck sipping a cocktail, her grey eyes sneering at the swarthy face of her much-loved admirer, it was her handsome young man that came to mind With the clear-eyed face of his husband, he thought about how he was commanding his secretary in a confident and unsuspecting tone, with the gentle grace of a man who knows well that others can't ask him what he wants and is willing to obey.
The hero of the novel, Mr. Ji, is a writer who writes around the clock in his study. His wife spends all day drinking, traveling and enjoying life. "Although she had a lot of affairs, the husband didn't care." He could not rely on his wife, but completely on his secretary, Miss Rexall. Miss Rexall, though small, was very capable, and adored him. "She not only had to record everything he said, but she had to type it out in triplicate while he was asleep." Mrs. Gee didn't understand. What's more, "these two spend ten hours together every day, and there is only one pen and a long list of endless words between them", how can they bear it? Actually, many years ago, Mr. Ji and his wife also The beautiful scenery of the good day, but now it has all vanished. "She wasn't interested in her husband anymore. She never even felt any pleasure in being with him. There was a silent, constant tension between them. Even though they were thousands of miles apart, the tension didn't interrupt."
It is not difficult to see that the theme of "Two Blue Birds" is still the relationship between men and women that Lawrence has been exploring. He believes that the most important relationship for human beings will always be the relationship between men and women. Therefore, adjusting the relationship between the sexes to make it harmonious has become the primary content in his philosophy of life. The characters in the novel also reflect the images of Lawrence himself, his wife Freda and Bright to varying degrees. Mr. Ji in the novel is a writer like Lawrence. The reason why Mr. Ji allowed his wife's romantic life to maintain that "pure spiritual relationship" with the secretary was probably due to his own "incompetence". This is related to Lawrence's life experiences after his illness. After entering middle age, Lawrence suffered from impotence. Aldington, an old friend who had been with them for many years, heard Freda complaining about Lawrence's impotence. Later, Bright also revealed that Lawrence was taking her to visit Italians. When they were friends, the two had rented a suite at the Parobe Hotel. Lawrence, who suffered from impotence, tried twice to have the same room with her. She was willing, but he failed. Impotence frustrates Lawrence. But because of Frieda's lustful lust, Lawrence had no choice but to accept the cruelty of her affair with Lawrence's friend Murray and the Italian officer Lavagli (whom Frieda married after Lawrence's death). Reality. He had written to El Brewster: Although they were married, their relationship had been bad for many years. He gave full play to his specialties and euphemistically projected his frustrations and depressions in his sexual life onto Mr. Ji in his works. In addition, he vented his impotence pain through poetry. In "All Day Rage" he wrote: "Lust is gone, everything in our bodies is dead." And "The Man Comes Sometime" describes the loneliness of a man because he has completely lost the ability to attract the sensuality of others. The reason why Lawrence poignantly satirizes Mr. Ji's indifference to his wife's affairs and his unusual relationship with his female secretary in the novel, because in his view, "if the spirit and the body cannot reconcile, if they do not have a natural balance and Natural mutual respect, life is embarrassing." It is impossible to establish pure friendship between men and women. Anything that goes against his philosophical view of "the unity of spirit and body" is intolerable. In his letter to Bright he articulates this view: "We are creatures of the unity of two elements, one being spiritual and one being physical, both are equally important. relationship - for example, a relationship based on a sensitive and delicate spiritual foundation - is bound to bring about a sudden emotional change, followed by betrayal... Now that you have left me, I am also relieved . . . You need to reflect and reflect at all times and everywhere, and strive to achieve true love and unity of body and spirit. "He likes to describe the spiritual world of the characters in his works, and the things that belong to the rational level represent his own thoughts or various contradictions and conflicts in his heart. Reveal his subjective intentions, and realize his "sermons" through the reader's understanding.
Lawrence was not only a novelist but also a philosopher. He likes social Family, human beings carry out profound philosophical thinking. "Two Qingwu" reveals his unique perspective of observing society and thinking about life. If we ask: Is it his art or his philosophy that keeps him alive and meaningful? The answer, of course, is his art. Although what he expresses in his works is the common theme of love and marriage in general novels, his expression method is unique. For example, the addition of the visual image of the two green ivy gives the story a new symbolic meaning, making people have to think about the hidden meaning behind its specific image. One day, Mr. Ji and his secretary were working in the outdoor garden, when a blue bird suddenly flew over, "flying smartly around the feet of the little secretary who was devoted to shorthand". Just when Mrs. Ji was surprised, it flew again. A Qingwu, "Two birds twisted together, compared to strength. A pair of blue birds, symbolizing happiness, are fighting for happiness." Mr Keji was "disturbed by these two fighting birds". More coincidentally, during afternoon tea, Mrs. Ji and the female secretary both appeared on the lawn wearing blue dresses. Obviously, the "two Qingwu" here refers to Mrs. Ji and the female secretary, and the scuffle between Qingwu implies a fight between two women. "They were drinking tea, and the two women looked at each other's blue dresses." Like two green blacks fighting, Mrs. Ji started the trouble first;
"My dear, what's the relationship between you two?"
"I am happy to work with him, I am happy to work for him, I am happy!" Miss Rexall exclaimed, tears of grievance and resentment welling in her eyes.
"My darling," the wife pretended to be excited, "then continue to work happily for him! As long as you can, be happy as long as you can. If you feel happy, why not enjoy it?"
Then she turned to her husband again: "You took so much from her and let her do it for nothing?"
"But he gave me everything, everything!" Rexo snapped her sister and shouted,
"You mean by 'everything' What?"
Miss Rexall was suddenly speechless when asked, the cold snap suddenly broke out, and the situation changed suddenly.
"I don't mean to make you jealous," said the little secretary, a little arrogant. "I've never been low on myself."
"God," said the wife, "you said it wasn't white? I said you never He has nothing from him, you just give, isn't this not self-deprecating?! - God!"
From the above description of the scene, we can see that Lawrence uses things to describe people, and uses the natural image of Qingwu to describe him. Refers to his irrational feelings, making them closer to nature, and conveys his own ridicule and boredom to the hypocritical relationship established in utopia and life lacking true feelings through the fight between two women. Mr. Ji not only seemed impatient with the twittering of the bluebirds in the air: "Go, go! Please go to another place to fight you", but also faced the battle between the "two blue blacks", his wife and secretary, who lived by his side. Nothing but silence. In this novel, Lawrence describes more family and personal psychological feelings, conveying a helpless sadness. He believes that "love between men and women is neither reverence nor petting, it is something deeper. It is a living touch, devotion and acceptance, a great and subtle relationship between men and women because of its depth and subtlety , and more because it is an inseparable part of nature, a kind of human nature, a normal human instinct that cannot be suppressed by Plato’s spiritual love.” It can be seen from this that Lawrence pays great attention to the feelings of the body, and he believes that knowledge is an inseparable part of the self. He would use this to attack modern people who merely abstract and spiritualize human life.
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