THE RAGGED TROUSERED PHILANTHROPISTS & LADY CHATTERLEY'S LOVER.

 Today on Pen and Paper, two 'classics' that, having first read them more years than I care to think of {the first when Mr T was first at university in the 1990's}, I recently re-read. 

THE RAGGED TROUSERED PHILANTHROPISTS by ROBERT TRESSELL. 

The Ragged Trousered Philanthropists tells the story of a group of working men who are joined one day by Owen, a journeyman-prophet with a vision of a just society. Owen's spirited attacks on the greed and dishonesty of the capitalist system rouse his fellow men from their political quietism.

Given my lack of interest in politics this was a strange choice of read for me when, no doubt encouraged by Mr T who at that time was at university, I first read it way back in the 1990's; that I enjoyed it so much that I requested a copy for that Christmas stranger still. That I am only now re-reading, well, not so strange given that its something of a mammoth read of almost 600 pages, its themes of British life both social, political, economic and cultural at a time when socialism was beginning to gain ground rather deep. 

Featuring a group of working men fighting to avoid a life of poverty, I felt myself quickly immersed {often uncomfortably so} in the unfolding drama and having to remind myself that this was a work of fiction albeit drawn from the author's own life experiences. That its relevance still speaks to me 110 years on; that all of the lies and explanations used to justify poverty and hardship then are still being used today, something that both angers and saddens me in equal amounts.

Despite its black humour, The Ragged Trousered Philanthropists is definitely not the easiest of readers and yet its the most important, thought provoking reads that I possess.

LADY CHATTERLEY'S LOVER by D.H. LAWRENCE.

Compassion, reverence and desire are interwoven in this revolutionary novel.

The story of the relationship between Constance Chatterley and Mellors, her crippled husband's gamekeeper, is Lawrence's most controversial novel - and perhaps his most complete and beautiful study of mutual love.

Writing to liberate the generations who, he felt, had regarded sex merely as an embarrassment or a mechanical act, he said about the book: I always labour at the same thing, to make the sex relation valid and precious, instead of shameful. And this novel is the furthest I've gone. To me is is beautiful and tender and frail as the naked self is.

First published in the late 1920's, I can't quite remember when this novel first came to my attention let alone when I first read it though a friend reassures me it was probably in the mid 1980's when, lets call him Philip, got hold of a copy which did the rounds amongst the boys in the fifth form. 

Anyway, re-read on a handful of occasions since whenever it was I first read it, whilst I no longer blush at the sex scenes, I admit I still don't like the words 'cunt' and 'fuck' which lets face it Lawrence uses in abundance and find myself positively recoiling at the use of the word 'nigger'

What remains an unashamed look at sex that is tame by todays standards {I'm pretty sure you'll not find it being passed around the school yard, adolescent boys giggling over it}; a study of marriage, class and disability, of two very different worlds co-existing in 1890's, Lady Chatterley's Lover is so much more than mere titillation.

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