God how I hate new countries: They are older than the old, more sophisticated, much more conceited, only young in a certain puerile vanity more like senility than anything.
D. H. LawrenceRead
One can no longer live with people: it is too hideous and nauseating. Owners and owned, they are like the two sides of a ghastly disease.
Interpretation
What this quote means
The quote reflects a deep disillusionment with societal structures and human relationships.
D. H. Lawrence expresses a profound sense of disgust with the dynamics between individuals in society, emphasizing the toxic aspects of ownership and power. He suggests that the relationship between 'owners' and the 'owned' creates a monstrous condition that renders coexistence unbearable, highlighting the deep-seated issues that arise from materialism and social hierarchy.
Themes
SocietyOwnershipDisillusionmentRelationshipsPower
In practice
Example use cases
During a lecture about societal structures, one might use this quote to illustrate the negative aspects of capitalism.
More from D. H. Lawrence
All quotes βA young man is afraid of his demon and puts his hand over the demon's mouth sometimes and speaks for him. And the things the young man says are very rarely poetry.
D. H. LawrenceRead
And besides, look at elder flowers and bluebells-they are a sign that pure creation takes place - even the butterfly. But humanity never gets beyond the caterpillar stage -it rots in the chrysalis, it never will have wings.It is anti-creation, like monkeys and baboons.
D. H. LawrenceRead
The Christian fear of the pagan outlook has damaged the whole consciousness of man.
D. H. LawrenceRead
The cosmos is a vast living body, of which we are still parts. The sun is a great heart whose tremors run through our smallest veins. The moon is a great nerve center from which we quiver forever. Who knows the power that Saturn has over us, or Venus? But it is a vital power, rippling exquisitely through us all the time.
D. H. LawrenceRead
... he preferred his own madness, to the regular sanity. He rejoiced in his own madness, he was free. He did not want that old sanity of the world, which was become so repulsive. He rejoiced in the new-found world of his madness. It was so fresh and delicate and so satisfying.
D. H. LawrenceRead
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Debt is a prolific mother of folly and of crime.
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