fiction files redux discussion

I'm a big fan of Lawrence's. I think he's in danger of slipping into obscurity.

Lawrence is a very interesting writer in British literary history...the son of an illiterate miner and a mother with middle class pretensions, he's a very strange mix of the rough and cultivated...his prose does tend to 'go on' a bit too much...but what I like most is his attempts at symbolism and the narrative-free structures of his novels...The Rainbow is my favourite...it's like the literary equivalent of a Terence Malick film...

I know he's famous as being obscene and a pornographer...but it's tame stuff compared to almost anything today.

So yeah, DH Lawrence...anybody else a fan?

Yeah, me too. I read his Sons and Lovers and I admit I did make use of his passages, expecially the part of the children's game, in where they play the same wild stupid sorrowful game over and over. His Women In Love, was also a masterpiece of course...but it does rely too heavily on Christlike figures. I often borrowed some of his images in my own writing which made it even better than I could have made it if I had not read him in my British/Irish Literture class ten years ago.
I have not read his Rainbow yet but will check it out when I am mature enough to grasp his concepts.

I still own the book with the cover of what looked like trees surrounding the house in Women In Love, and the trees looked vaguely like bulky looking woman making love to a man, and it seemed symbolic to me, that the image of what going on behind closed door is usually sex.

I am familiar with his work and gladly, his writing is very rich and at the same time earthy. Sheesh, it had been too long since I read his work.

After an over-enthusiastic immersion in Lawrence in college (I had a friend who called me Rupert Birkin and Women in Love was one of maybe three major texts for me in college), I wandered away from Lawrence. Read some of his non-fiction in my twenties but have always held a warm spot for him in my heart... just haven't read him in a while. I'm embarrassed to say that while I've read some of his more obscure stuff like Apocalypse and essays from Phoenix (which can border on silly), I have never read The Rainbow and know I should... Thanks for the reminder. Now I just gotta find my old copy.

I'm reading D.H. Lawrence's Kangaroo at the moment...it's great!

You know, we need some group reads in here to liven things up a bit. I'm just sayin'... I'll volunteer to be the grumpy postmodern feminist but I draw the line at not shaving my armpits for the duration of the discussion.

(Kidding, of course. I would approach any discussion with the utmost gravity.)

So my library was having this summer classics thing this week and in dropping off some stuff I saw Women In Love. I picked it up and started it today. I got it because I recall from way back that DH Lawrence was exploring a "new" way for men and women to relate to one another at the time.

I am two chapters in and had to read that first chapter a second time out loud.

It's amazing Ursula and Gudrun can even get up out of their chairs from the fear of what might happen next! As though they might just drop dead! One never knows! And the contradictory body language, and emotions, vs. words... it's really hard to keep track of whom is feeling and thinking what and there is no explanation as to why. It reads like a play.

And Hermione. Whoa. What's up with Hermione? So smart and independent and wealthy, knows Rupert is trying to ditch her, but can't stand to be more than a few inches away from him? Such inner conflict.

And why are these women so dead set against marriage and children (or deeply ambivalent about it) but go weak in the knees and simply MUST know these two men? During a wedding, no less? And what's with their entirely un-British names?

In all seriousness. I think that bit may be about the ambivalence over a social institution vs. the need to connect to another human... personally, sexually, men and women being a bit on the mysterious side to one another. Around having children I can understand the ambivalence more, because of the medical risks at the time.

And what is Rupert's thing about people who are sitting in front of him not existing, saying no one matters, and Gudrun's critique that he treats everyone with such importance?

This all goes to say, this Lawrence guy is kind of frustrating. I mean, I feel like I can read and understand him, but the internal drama his female characters seem to feel doesn't seem real to me.

I'm trying not to think about this in terms of women today. In fact, in my own life I have been told that I overthink things... and am really emotional... not that you would know it from the outside... so maybe Lawrence makes sense?

Anyone (Martyn?) have some words of wisdom for me as I venture in?

Studies in Classic American Literature was where I discovered DHL. I’ve read everything he’s written since, and think he a great writer who’s work, despite Martyn’s concerns, will remain classics. I am curious, in response to a post from Hugh a while back, if DHL is a “twentysomething” author, the way Hermann Hesse (or Joyce in some ways) is notorious for being poignant and relevant for the post-high-school, stranded-by-the-tide post-adolescent crowd. I know that The Rainbow and Sons and Lovers were at the top of my list for years, but though I still admire his ability to really, really pen a great sentence, the underlying metaphorical waters don’t carry me as swiftly as they once did.

I find that much of what I was drawn to was his understanding of Woman in the personal, societal, and allegorical senses (lead heroines dance pregnant and naked under the moon, etc.)

Studies in Classic in American Literature is DHL’s theme of Womanhood in a nutshell and I particularly like his essay on Poe’s doppelgangers (though there are two more essays on Melville and one on Whitman before he is finished. Just good clean fun for our type of reader). And yes, DHL is the one who got me to pick up Moby Dick after merely skimming through it in HS.

Any maybe this Woman at the root of all his writing was why his stories were so important to this twentysomething, and maybe a bit more jaded at my ripe age. Any similar experience out there? Hugh: what is your take on why you were such a DHL fan back in the day?

mm

So I was thinking about this and talking about it with a couple of people. Their experiences with reading him, etc.

I read Women in Love once when I was in high school, but I don't think I understood a damn thing.

In college he was the topic of my feminist lit crit class (a class I nicknamed... oh, never mind) quite a bit but I have to admit, he did not a whole lot for me.

There was this one passage we read in class about how this woman character could only orgasm after the man had ejaculated inside her. I thought that was weird. I can't remember which book.

I think it was because I thought he was kind of... wrong headed about women. I also thought that it would be impossible, without having a psychotic break of some type, to have so much inner conflict and emotions coursing through a person, and then they have to appear all... composed, and never say a thing they mean.

The jury is still out, as I'm still reading Women in Love.

I think, though, that he might appeal to 20-somethings because there is a lot of... emotional changing happening during that time. At least, there was for me. Coming out of puberty, starting to grow up... and being more interested in the opposite sex for things other than their parts.

Michael wrote: "Studies in Classic American Literature was where I discovered DHL. I’ve read everything he’s written since, and think he a great writer who’s work, despite Martyn’s concerns, will re..."

Michael: sorry it's taken me so long to get to this! That's a great question. I may have felt the same way about Lawrence the same way I think some younger readers feel about Ayn Rand (though I hate admitting that)... There was something refreshing about his passion and clear articulation of his point of view. I need to go back to all of those novels and essays I immersed myself in but (and I know I'm biased here) I have a feeling I'll still find Lawrence a superior writer. The fact that he (unlike Rand) actually gives a damn about each character (I'm thinking about the conflicts he sympathetically embraces in Gerard and Gudrun in Women in Love) and the honest fumbling with sexuality he explores in Lady Chatterley's Lover. What they share is an angry challenge to society-as-they-see it... where I think Lawrence excels is in his love of language and exploration of issues over Rand's polemicism (though God knows Lawrence also had his own affinity for soap boxes.)

Read Twilight in Italy.

Tonight I was on the tube back from Harrow and this man was reading a book...and I kept trying to read the cover and I couldn't so I just said, "what are you reading?" and he showed me and replied, "Lady Chatterley's Lover...been trying to read it for 30 years"...which made me smile...nobody ever talks to anybody on the tube...but I broke the law!

Martyn - or "Marty" here in the states, oh God I can't imagine calling you Marty - I was just up in Taos, New Mexico at the beginning of the summer for a week's vacation "bachelor time". DHL was part of that artist's colony back in the 1920's and lived in a ranch there, which I visited. No pictures, sorry.

Thought of you. If you ever get a chance you should visit the American Southwest. Get a hat, the sun is something else on baldies like you and me. But you should definitely come out to New Mexico someday. The people actually talk with you on the bus.
mm

Michael wrote: "Martyn - or "Marty" here in the states, oh God I can't imagine calling you Marty - I was just up in Taos, New Mexico at the beginning of the summer for a week's vacation "bachelor time". DHL was p..."

I would love to visit the American Southwest one day...I always loved the varied landscapes of the US...really you Americans have everything...desert, mountains, lovely beaches, amazing forests...which is rather wonderful.

That ranch in Taos was Lawrence's favourite place in the whole wide world...I'd love to see it one day. Whether or not his ashes are there...that's open to debate as what happened to them is quite a farce...and quite sad. My girlfriend is from Nottinghamshire, not far from Eastwood and when I get a chance to go the Lawrence museum...there will be photos for everybody to enjoy.

Today I was bought a first edition of D.H. Lawrence's travel book Etruscan Places. I love it. There was an Ezra Pound collection, too. But I chose Lawrence the wife beater over Ezra the fascist. c'est la vie.