The Theme of Love in the Works of J. Green

Abstract

The article deals with the peculiarities of love in the works of J. Green, one of the most prominent representatives of the French Catholic Renewal. A kind of capricious and rather accidental romantic love, which appears as enslavement, though excluding the context of personal relations, plays an important role in almost all works of J. Green. Green’s characters avoid intimacy – this significant trait can be traced in their personal relationships at all levels, beginning with family ties – between husband and wife, parents and children, often, if not always, being the cause of their unhappiness. Even though they try to be happy, it seems that their behavior shows the opposite – they choose wrong objects of their love, or distance themselves from them. It is difficult to explain such an attitude otherwise than that their attempt to reach happiness represents a human search for an absolute. In a certain sense Green’s approach in choosing the subject and material for his work is similar to what F. Mauriac does in his works. Mauriac’s works have open ends, being stories of danger or disorder, in which a dark hero finds himself/herself. A story ends at the moment when the danger is about to disappear. In the same manner J. Green presents his characters at the point where their lives can be changed...