On the wall at home is a framed photograph of T.E. Lawrence taken in his chunky forties. The photo, a postcard advertising an exhibition of historical artefacts, is a close-up of his face. Knowing what we do about his pathological aversion to most human contact, the camera’s nearness is startling. And the thing is, in spite of all those biographies telling us what a sensitive aesthete Lawrence was, the face confronting the onlooker is that of a thug. The Desperate Dan-sized chin, the eyes too close together, the cruel mouth: it’s the kind of face one saw frequently in the away ends of football grounds in the 1970s, especially among the police. The impression of thuggishness is here emphasised by a surly gaze. He’d shoot you as soon as look at you. The photo makes me laugh inwardly every time I notice it.
I remember attending a lecture 20 years ago, during which a few sensitive souls ostentatiously walked out in protest because the lecturer casually referred to the San people’s buttocks as being distinctive. Racism, apparently. One no longer notices biological or physical difference. Poor San people! I thought. Extermination isn’t enough. Now we must even turn a blind eye to their marvellous buttocks. But as the Enlightenment flame burns ever brighter, doubtless the practice of inferring character from the facial features of individuals is now also due for a mopping-up operation by the thought police, after which there will be more talk of ‘strong’ chins, ‘sensuous’ mouths or — heaven forbid — ‘coarse’ faces.
On my mother’s side of the family, we have an inherited nose, a monstrous great thing, known as ‘the Brice bugle’. I would argue that the Brice bugle is similar to a San person’s buttocks, in that it in no way delineates racial or individual character.
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