BOOKS
Mystery Motorist
Br CHRISTOPHER SYKES THE decline of Lawrence of Arabia's reputa- tion is one of the most catastrophic in recent fat!It is easy to see why the disaster has come Ft?Ht. He was an untruthful man who gave phase of accounts of himself in almost every 1-1'43e of his life, and so it is possible to interpret „_I! Whole career as a gigantic imposture. In his Lutographical enquiry' Mr. Aldington did this very `L'irt8 with devastating effect and great injustice: 't e stressed the man's weaknesses to such an ex- tent as to leave an impression on the unwary reader that Lawrence had accomplished not only ,e85 than he said, but nothing at all. This was a`e introduce a new misrepresentation worse than 1 /111 of Lawrence's own. But the damage to the
to was final, and, in spite of able attempts
ii- rescue it from the ruins, the reputation re- laills in an abnormally depressed state. h I this book,* Professor A. W. Lawrence has f:irl the idea of publishing letters to Lawrence h"(3'11 thirty-seven distinguished people, in the r°,,,11,et., that the light thus thrown on his famous -tv't,".'"er may act `as a corrective' to accounts 4'0'1 have `inadequately portrayed or mispor- 144,,,Yed' him. The idea is ingenious and particu- Y suited to the subject. Lawrence's persbnality teaks so dominating that it is often unmistakably "r°eci in letters to him. fora two, one from Doughty and one ITIQn111, rlecker, all the letters are post-war. The 0,;',13,11tY are on literary matters, with over thirty as thesubject of The Seven Pillars of Wisdom tio" °ver a dozen on The Mint. As with all collec- nrris of letters, the contents are of very varying eberest. Those from Sir Winston Churchill, for ample, do not compare in merit with his essay
12n, `• E. Lawrence by his Friends (also edited
p'et 'rofessor A. W. Lawrence), while E. M. ofr,ster'S letter in criticism of The Seven Pillars Wisdom, written- before meetingitsauthor, studi);erhaPs his best contribution to Lawrence wh'es. Some of the feeblest letters are from stirere one might expect the best. There arc great k.Pr.ises, including four fascinating letters from %rig.
The
curi correspondence with Doughty is very of ..31-1s, Lawrence's ardent loyalty to the author lite"il'ia Deserta is one of the best things in his of ;_,and Mr. Aldington's sententious denigration hisms clandestine generosity to the old man in of Poverty is one of the most repulsive features ittit, rePulsive book. Doughty admired Lawrence thelliselY, but there came a difficult moment in pitir relationship when he was shown The Seven to clirs,,, of Whdom. Like many who have sought givi'lluoence others, Doughty was full of mis- ----...,11g when he saw the effects of his influence * i----------_______ 1.06,rbence. RS To T. E. LAWRENCE. Edited by A. W. (Cape. 35s.) on the work of a passionate disciple. He was too kind to say so, too honest to pretend approval. The central passage of his letter of thanks, avoid- ing or almost avoiding literary praise, runs as follows: Now all that fog is dispersed, and. I am able to view your vast war-work near at hand, with its almost daily multifarious terrible and diffi- cult haps, experiences, physical and mental strains, and suffering and dark chances that must needs be taken, in meeting and circuit- venting enemies, in the anxious Leadership of an Armada of discordant elements, as often naturally hostile among themselves of Arab tribes; until after two years, you won through to the triumph of Damascus, after enduring all that human life can endure to the end. A great artist, a fatal model.
The other star turns are by Mr. Siegfried Sassoon, Bernard Shaw and Lord Trenchard. When reading the Sassoon and Shaw letters, one may regret that their influence on Lawrence was not greater. They gave him the best of advice— to come off it, to realise that he could make his way as a writer, to stop his long, complicated, wasteful act. Siegfried Sassoon calls him a `mystery motorist,' and writes about The Seven Pillars of Wisdom:
Damn you, how long do you expect me to go on reassuring you about your bloody master- piece? It is a GREAT book, blast you. Are you satisfied, you tank-vestigating eremite? Bernard Shaw disapproves of the aircraftsman business and tells him he should have collected £20,000 from the government as a gratuity. Neither could shake him out of his self-dramatis- ing self-puzzlement.
The worst letters are from H. M. Tomlinson. It is unfair to criticise adversely private papers not meant for publication, but these ask for the treatment: they horribly recall the facetious, mannered, mincing preciosity which in 1930 was still thought good literary manners. The Forster letters by comparison show them up cruelly.
Does the book achieve its purpose of rein- statement? To a small extent, yes. Two letters from Lord Stamfordham make it clear that Law- rence's action in refusing a decoration from the King in 1919 has been misrepresented. The original story was that Lawrence boorishly re- fused the decoration at an investiture, explain- ing that since the British Government was breaking faith with the Arab princes, he might soon feel compelled to fight with them against his own countrymen. The later story was that Lawrence's refusal occurred not in public but during a private audience (which was the fact), giving the same reasons. Lawrence maintained that he never suggested that he would fight against his country. Lord Stamfordham's second letter quotes a Buckingham Palace memorandum written on the day of the audience, and it shows that what Lawrence really said was that he might find himself fighting for the Arab kingdom of Syria (largely a British creation) against the in- vading French. Many people felt the same then; but what really needs to be remembered is that Lawrence's action was not merely exhibitionism, but an attempt to draw attention to grave politi- cal wrongs. According to Sir Winston Churchill, the best possible witness here, he succeeded. Lawrence would be better exonerated. however, if he himself had not helped on the original story. This is not mentioned.
The letters dispose of another matter for hostile criticism : Lawrence's apparently aimless coyness about publishing The Mint. This has understandably seemed to many an exasperating piece of mystification, and parallel to the case of The Seven Pillars of Wisdom. The very curious and interesting letters from Lord Tren- chard provide an interpretation creditable to Lawrence. In 1928 Lord Trenchard made the strongest possible appeal to him not to publish, and there is no reason to doubt that this appeal fully explains what happened.
The book would be better reading if the edi- tor had given longer extracts from his brother's side of the correspondence; some letters are only fully understood if one knows in detail what they answered. The editing, as to accuracy, seemed impeccable to this reviewer till he reached a foot- note recording that Sir Mark Sykes committed suicide. In fact Sir Mark Sykes died of influenza in circumstances related in accurate detail in Sir Shane Leslie's biography. So large an edi- torial bloomer naturally shakes confidence in the background research, but it may be a solitary ineptitude. It is an unfortunate one in a book designed to change widespread opinion.
And what about opinion? As indicated, the correctives only affect relatively minor con- siderations; the great blot on Lawrence's repu- tation, his chronic untruthfulness, is not seriously touched on. It cannot be dismissed as a prejudiced accusation, if only because it is evidenced by admirers, most clearly by Richard Meinertzhagen in his Middle East Diary, 1917-1956. He and Lawrence were in neighbouring rooms in a Paris hotel at the time of the peace conference, and they became close friends. 'He rather clings to me,' noted Meinertzhagen at the time, 'as he says I am the only person who understands him.' To Meinertzhagen Lawrence showed The Seven Pillars of Wisdom, and admitted that 'though it purports to be the truth, a great deal of it is fancy.' His friend commented: `His self-decep- tion filled him with great bitterness. Shall he run away and hide . . . or carry the myth on?' This typical state of divided mind can possibly ex- plain the supposed loss of the MS some months later, and certainly explains in large part his self-escape via the RAF. Lawrence's flight into obscurity has met with less sympathy than it deserved. It seems certain that his purpose was self-purification by the de- struction of the false self built up by myth. To quote Colonel Meinertzhagen again : `He got what he wanted, knew it was false and got frightened. He found out that his life was an enacted lie.' It was more or less inevitable that as chief architect of the myth hefaltered on the hard moral way he chose, but that does not mean that he failed in the end. Those who dis-. paraged his disappearing act may have been wrong after all. Aircraftsman T. E. Shaw was accused of backing into the limelight, and he sometimes did so. but he seems to have been happiest in his last RAF days, by which time he had backed right out of it.
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