ABSTRACT
In this chapter I want to argue that Kangaroo can and should be read in connection to the tradition of philosophical anarchism. Before I do, however, it is necessary to point out that taking such an approach to this novel is bound to meet with at least two obvious and immediate lines of resistance. The first line derives from the fact that throughout Kangaroo the terms “anarchy” and “anarchist” are used in incontrovertibly negative ways. Anarchists here are depicted as “nihilists” (21), and “anarchy” itself is regarded as nothing more than an “irresponsible” sense of freedom, leading to a “vacancy” that is “almost terrifying” (27). Even the lines quoted at the head of this chapter suggest the idea that one becomes an anarchist only through an initiating process of failure, through being unable to recognize the self-evident truth that all members of a society must submit themselves to the “necessity for rule.” Thus a reader who looks to Kangaroo for a sympathetic word concerning “anarchy” or the “anarchist” looks in vain: Lawrence registers these terms within a hostile and very narrow range of understanding.
