She demonstrates this ideal earlier in the novel with the 'companionable silence' maintained by Roland and Maud even after the dramatic discovery that they share a deep desire for a lack of desire, and that by some 'powerful coincidence' they both picture this ideal state as an empty, clean, white bed (290-1). This growth is characterized by a series of curiously desexualized exchanges during which Byatt seems to be reminding her readers that a relationship should not be based on such intense passion that either partner owns the other, but on a mutual exchange of self in which both partners maintain and relinquish equal degrees of what Maud so aptly describes as 'self-possession' (Byatt 549). Woven though all of the colorful prose, rich literary allusion, and potent sensuality of Possession are portrayals of several love relationships, but the interaction between Byatt's male and female protagonists, Roland Michell and Maud Bailey, seems to be the ideal when compared to the other male-female relationships she depicts.ĭuring their mad pursuit of information related to a preveiously unknown affair between the poets Randolph Henry Ash, the focus of Roland's academic career, and Christabel LaMotte, Maud's personal specialty, a relationship between the two scholars evolves: from cool professionalism to an unspoken understanding, to a tenuous romance. Byatt's Possession: A Romance provided me with a literary example of several romantic relationships that made me stop and think about my own vision of the perfect romance, whose description I will refrain from embarrassing myself with here. The idea of the ideal relationship appears again and again, be it during the battle of the sexes or the queer rights movement.

From ancient texts such as the Hebrew Song of Solomon to Shakespeare's Dark Lady sonnets and modern rock and roll lyrics, it seems that everyone with a voice has something to say about their relationships (or lack thereof).

Rather, I was making a point about love and its universality, a subject that has inspired art and literature for as long as such things have existed. I might argue otherwise, but this is not a paper about the intimate and intricate details of my love life. Of course, at age eighteen, having officially had only one such association, I suppose I may seem (and probably am) less than qualified to speak expertly on this particular aspect of human experience. Searching for the Ideal Relationship in A.S.

Are you sure you don't want to go into English literature instead of science?' Eeek! He meant well, I'm sure, but I didn't know then if science was my thing, and I don't know now. Comments from my professor at the time sent me into conniptions: 'I hate it when such a jumbled peer-editing draft results in such a fine paper - it undermines all of my authority. This paper is the product of an all-nighter I pulled during my freshman year of college.

Possession byatt