Wounds and hopes in D.H. Lawrence

2. The Novel “Lady Chatterley’s Lover” 4

When we read “Sons and Lovers” in our seminar I was so impressed by the psychological awareness of D.H. Lawrence that I decided to write a term paper on another of his novels: “Lady Chatterley’s Lover”.

Reading the novel I noticed how hurt and isolated the characters are portrayed in the beginning and how dark and dismal the industrial surroundings are illustrated. Nevertheless, we can see a little simmering of hope at the end of the novel. This captured my attention and I started to focus on the ‘wounds’ of the characters, moving on to looking at what keeps them alive and by what ‘hopes’ they are driven. This is also what I will do in this paper, following the question what kind of ‘wounds’ the characters are suffering from and in what ways their

2. The Novel “Lady Chatterley’s Lover”

Oliver Mellors quite resembles the young D.H. Lawrence, neither really belonging to the working- nor the middle class. He is a collier’s son, a “Tevershall lad born and bred”, as Clifford’s nurse Mrs. Bolton tells us on page 151. As Buckley points out, he cannot unequivocally be seen as a representative of the working class, as he is very well educated and has even been an officer in the army in India and Egypt (cf. Buckley 55). On the other hand he has also worked as a blacksmith and is now working as Sir Clifford’s gamekeeper. He can speak King’s English as well as broad vernacular, which he lapses into whenever he puts up an opposition to Connie’s belonging to the upper class or her mental world. He had had the chance to move up within the social order, but he did not take it, for “he was frightened to go out and face the world”, as Mrs. Bolton tells us once more (LCL 151). To my mind, Mellors seems to suffer from several psychic wounds. He has been hurt by women, especially by his bullying wife Bertha Coutts. He is annoyed by the modern women’s sexual behaviour. In his opinion, modern women either do not want sex at all or they use men like tools for their own sensations, but they do not “’come’ naturally with a man” (LCL 212). This made him bitter and he withdrew himself from women. When he meets Connie, he feels resentful at her in the beginning, viewing her as threat to the peace he has found in the wood, as a dangerous “trespass on his privacy” (LCL 91). He dreads her modern way of having her own will. Only with recognizing her forlornness when he sees her crying at the chicken’s coops he slowly begins to give in to his feelings for her.

Some topics in this essay:
Connie Mellors, Bertha Coutts, Clifford Connie’s, Oliver Mellors, Success” LCL, Sir Clifford’s, Clifford Connie, DH Lawrence, Lady Chatterley, Moreover Clifford, cf lcl, chatterley’s lover”, “lady chatterley’s, “lady chatterley’s lover”, oliver mellors, …” lcl, dh lawrence, mental world, world words, lady constance chatterley, clifford chatterley, sir clifford, sir clifford chatterley, 242 hope tenderness, 241 hope success,