[ilds] Spirits of Place

[James Gifford]

Hi Bruce,

Just a minor note (apart from adding that Jan was exceptionally 
articular and kind at the Durrell School of Corfu this summer -- a 
marvellous public speaker).  You comment:

> if Morris's point is not to claim "'resemblance,' 
> equivalence, sympathy, or even analogy between  
> these very different writers," what's the point 
> of lumping all these very different writers 
> together?  

I think this is actually answered in the original text.  Under the 
heading of "Influences" the reporter (whoever he or she is) has written 
"She calls Lawrence Durrell 'a virtuoso conjurer of the spirit of place' 
and also admires evocations of cityscapes penned by Joseph Conrad, 
Dickens and Dostoevsky."  To my mind, that "also admires" denotes 
exactly that: also.  I like miso paste as a marinate for salmon and I 
also like Telemann's recorder concertos -- that hardly means I think 
they're the same thing.  Morris clearly likes Durrell's evocations of 
Place (or "inventions" of place if you prefer), and she also likes how 
Dostoevsky, Dickens, and Conrad describe city locales as well.  Those 
are her admitted influences.  A better question, though, are her 
unadmitted influences...

But, on a more exciting note, I would disagree with one other comment 
you imply, but I do think both options are available as viable readings:

> Durrell seems to find some "spirit" in a place, 
> whether or not that is true, and I would tend to 
> argue it is not.  These other writers are closer 
> to being expressionist and use a landscape or 
> "cityscape" as backdrops for some message.

I would argue very strongly that Durrell uses the cityscape in order to 
communicate his message, much of which I see playing out in the tension 
between the rural and the urban.  He certainly has a very different 
message from Conrad, Dickens, and Dostoevsky, but all of them use the 
city for part of their argument.  You're quite right, though, to note 
the expressionist difference.  As for the place's "spirit," I think we 
need to see this as yet another of Durrell's "strong readings" of D.H. 
Lawrence, after which the nature of that spirit and his revision of it 
is, to me at least, more sensible.

Best,
James
____________________________________
James Gifford
Department of English
Mount Royal College
4825 Mount Royal Gate SW
Calgary, Alberta, T3E 6K6
http://members.shaw.ca/james.gifford