He was a great British adventurer of the early 20th century, a mix of archaeologist, military strategist and writer. His life was so eventful that it ended up becoming a highly successful film in the 60s. Thomas Edward Lawrence, or simply TE Lawrence, began the trajectory that would make him world famous between 1911 and 1914, during which time he worked on an archaeological expedition in the Middle East.
He took the opportunity to learn Arabic and get to know the customs of the region. When World War I broke out in 1914, he enlisted in the Armed Forces and, due to his knowledge of Egypt and the Middle East, he began to provide strategic information for the British Army. His main role in the war, however, was another. Lawrence helped to weaken the Turkish-Ottoman Empire, enemy of the British, encouraging Arab tribes to rebel against the Turks.
Not everything, however, went as he wanted. In 1917, the adventurer was captured by the Ottomans and, before he managed to escape, he was tortured and suffered sexual violence. At the end of the war, in 1918, traumatized by his experiences and disillusioned with the treatment given by the British to their old Arab allies, he refused decorations and left the Army.
During the 1920s, Lawrence dedicated himself to writing his memoirs, organized in the book The Seven Pillars of Wisdom. Although the work is somewhat inaccurate and fanciful in many respects, it has acquired great historical and artistic importance. “It is one of the few works written in English in the 20th century to present an epic vision of contemporary characters, revealing the complex transformations that its author went through”, says critic and historian Stanley Weintraub, from Pennsylvania State University, in the United States. Lawrence died on May 19, 1935, aged 47, from injuries he had sustained six days earlier in a motorcycle accident.
arabic by choice
To face the Turks, he went to live like their allies in the Middle East
During World War I, the Turkish-Ottoman Empire, an ally of Germany and an enemy of the British, occupied much of the Middle East. This jeopardized the functioning of the Suez Canal, in Egypt, an important maritime connection used by the British to reach their Asian colonies. As several Arab tribes were unhappy to see their lands under Turkish control, the British used this uprising to galvanize the Arabs against the invaders. TE Lawrence was sent to the Middle East to provide a little military aid to the tribes. Transformed into an advisor to the main Arab chief, Hussein ibn Ali, the English adventurer led important guerrilla attacks against the Turks. The press then started referring to the adventurer as Lawrence of Arabia. He actually began to dress like his allies and admire the people who fought alongside him. The Arab Revolt decisively weakened the Turkish Empire. After the end of the war, however, the British and the other victorious European powers divided the map of the Middle East according to their interests, ignoring the claims of the Arab tribes, despite the promises of autonomy they had made to them.
success on screens
Legendary Briton’s story turned into an Oscar-winning film
TE Lawrence’s busy life was made into a Hollywood classic in the 1960s (pictured above). In the movie Lawrence of Arabia, directed by David Lean, actor Peter O’Toole played the role of the British adventurer. The work earned seven Oscars, but is far from being a faithful representation of the complicated relations between Arabs and British during the First War. “The film makes use of stereotypes and clichés. This is the case, for example, of the generalization of all Arabs as a kind of disorganized bunch, unaware of the basic principles of ‘civilization’. That the Arabs considered him a kind of prophet, then, that’s the end of the road,” says Arab literature professor Mamede Mustafa Jarouche, from USP.