Individualism and paradox in the works of DH LawrenceWhen you read something by DH Lawrence, you often end up wondering the same thing: does he hate people? Lawrence has a deep interest in us humans, but it is the fascination of a child scratching a scab that drives him, rather than some sort of scientific or spiritual quest for a mythical "social truth." Some of Lawrence's works - "Insouciance", for example - openly question the tendencies of humanity: what good is a world of "white-haired women" who waste time "worrying" and seem intelligent and cultured and talk about issues pretentious and bourgeois? ?(2)But this work is blatant in its negative descriptions of people and their behavior in society. At one point in “Insouciance,” the narrator, Lawrence, comes out and pontificates for several paragraphs about the flaws of “modern” society. But for me, it's the subtler pieces that hold the most power. When Lawrence hints, insinuates, or implies his opinions, he is in a sense letting us discover the kernel of the truth, no matter how shocking or controversial. This process, used in “Mercury,” is far more interesting than Lawrence’s almost direct missive used in “Insouciance,” which flatly states his view of what “living” really is. Because not only do we have to discover its meaning; we must also decide whether our interpretation is indeed Lawrence's intent: perhaps we have confused some inadvertent infiltration of Lawrence's personal venom with the intended meaning. It's a risk we will have to take when analyzing works like "Mercury". Instead of condemning society in “Mercury,” Lawrence actually tries to leave it, ascending to the “top of the Merkur,” where he has a new vantage point on the world. It develops some of the same ideas as "Insouciance," but by the end of the work Lawrence redeems society, or at least apologizes for it, adding new fire to our question. Ultimately we can't, with certainty, say whether Lawrence hates people or not - and this reflects some sort of internal struggle for Lawrence. One might narrow the scope and dilute the importance of this topic by suggesting that the "Sunday people" Lawrence Critics are not humanity as a whole, but rather a specific group: perhaps the vacationing Schlegels of the upper-middle class, perhaps lower-middle-class aspiring pseudo-intellectual Leonard Basts, who think culture lies in a misunderstood walk through the woods..