로렌스와 모리슨의 원시 자연적 실존

Abstract

This study aims to discuss D. H. Lawrence’s and Toni Morrison’s contextual traits of primitive being in The Rainbow, Women in Love, and Song of Solomon. It is a matter of course that Lawrence’s sexual-philosophical theme doesn’t seem to be in contextual line with Morrison’s racial-sexual-sociological one. Yet, Lawrence and Morrison share critical perspectives in that their societies are governed by white traditional value-systems, such as capitalistic materialism, mechanic consistency, and white heroism. And these shared perspectives project their ideal aims on the restoration of the primitive being which is scorned by the civil code of white capitalistic society and its value-systems. Lawrence’s and Morrison’s insistence on the restoration of the primitive being reflects their perception that man has lived most of his life in basic contact with the principles of nature and his being is formed by that experience. In The Rainbow and Women in Love, Lawrence truly intends to say that the primitive being is more fundamental and active than the civic element. But the pivotal thing Lawrence attempts to show in these novels is that the physical being is not all man wants and that the physical satisfaction which marriage may bring isn’t perfect. The ideal aim he projects in his novels is that of a mutually coordinated physical-spiritual fulfillment. He shows his ideal aim of this kind through Ursula’s and Birkin’s efforts which mutually search for an inter-perceptive and inter-subjective basis in their relationship and in their continuing development of self-fulfillment and self-creation. Meanwhile, in Song of Solomon, Morrison symbolically uses the character Macon Dead to criticize the fetishization of materialism and bourgeoisie value-systems just as Lawrence does in his novels. Her intention is to suggest that Macon’s materialism and value-system connected to it go against the spirit and brotherhood of black society. Therefore, taking subversive action against Macon, the pivotal thing on which she paradoxically insists in this novel is that the spirit and brotherhood of black society is originally like Pilate’s inter-subjective way of life based on the principle of nature. Unlike her brother Macon who is governed by materialism, Pilate lives an ethereal life in a furnitureless cabin devoid of such civic conveniences as gas, electricity etc.— a spiritual life that she found as a child on Lincoln’s Heaven. And Morrison projects her concept of primitive being on Pilate’s life of this kind, getting her to initiate Milkman’s birth and lead his spiritual rebirth from his father’s cover of materialism to his primitive- mythological roots. Therefore, Morrison’s idea of primitive being reflected in Pilate and her way of life is not different from Lawrence’s in terms of how the principles of nature are closely connected with the incarnation of a spiritual value-system.