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Carl Krockel. D. H. Lawrence and Germany: The Politics of Influence. Amsterdam and New York: Rodopi, 2007. Pp. ix + 333. $100.00 (paper).
The influence of a few German-speaking thinkers and writers on D. H. Lawrence's work has been well documented over the years, but, somewhat surprisingly, there has been no broader investigation of the influence of German thought and Germanic culture on Lawrence until this study by Carl Krockel. It must be said that Krockel goes about his investigation with efficiency and scholarly thoroughness. His book serves to remind us of how intellectual Lawrence's interests were from a young age and how current he kept himself with the major streams of European intellectual development. There is no doubt that German and Germanic culture long held an attraction for Lawrence. He had a German wife, of course, but he also had relatives of his own in Germany (the Krenkows), lived in the country for short periods of time, and learned the language passably. His fascination with Germany can also be seen in an obvious way in works like "The Prussian Officer," "The Mortal Coil," Mr Noon and in the setting of much of The Captain s Doll in occupied Germany (and, later on in the novella, in Austria) just after the Great War. While it is often true, if trite, to say that the devil is in the details, in this study the details are mostly interesting and well documented but that the devil is in the generalizations drawn from them. Far too often we get descriptions of parallel development or speculation rather than evidence of direct influence. There are times when Krockel stretches a point or engages in special pleading or makes a speculation sound like a definitive conclusion. By the end of the book, moreover, I remained as puzzled as I was at the outset about the significance of the "Politics" of the book's subtitle.
Krockel makes countless comparisons between Lawrence's writing (most particularly the novels) and German works in philosophy, literature, music, and painting, some very helpful indeed, including the locating of Freud's influence fairly precisely and persuasively. But at times the comparisons seem jarring or far-fetched. We learn that "The Mortal Coil," for instance, is Lawrence's first exploration of Max Weber's...