Clive was more in love with the idea of love than he was capable of actually feeling it. Or, to be more gentle, he just wasn't, deep down, that interested in the practical, every day concerns of being with another person in that way. Yes, this makes an awful lot of sense. It's quite difficult to discuss these couple of chapters without reference to Ch12 which gives a few details of how Clive became who he is. There's a strong sense of him building up this ideal scenario along his interpretation of Phaedrus and of course nothing he ever experiences with anyone can live up to it. Partly because it's his dream and his rationalisation of what he had until then seen as the Great Taint (or whatever words he'd used), one that he had arrived at on his own rather than with somebody.
In a way, I think Clive's dream of the right kind of companionship would only ever have been possible at Cambridge (or alternative academic surroundings where classics can become a central part of your life) and once he's out of there, it dies completely.
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Date: 2009-06-20 04:07 pm (UTC)Yes, this makes an awful lot of sense. It's quite difficult to discuss these couple of chapters without reference to Ch12 which gives a few details of how Clive became who he is. There's a strong sense of him building up this ideal scenario along his interpretation of Phaedrus and of course nothing he ever experiences with anyone can live up to it. Partly because it's his dream and his rationalisation of what he had until then seen as the Great Taint (or whatever words he'd used), one that he had arrived at on his own rather than with somebody.
In a way, I think Clive's dream of the right kind of companionship would only ever have been possible at Cambridge (or alternative academic surroundings where classics can become a central part of your life) and once he's out of there, it dies completely.