Name: Harshita Chandolia

Course: B.A. (Hons.) English

Roll No. : 16/1341

Topic: Lawrence’s representation of women in ‘Sons and

Lawrence once said, “one, sheds one’s sickness in books.” This is the truth of sons
and lovers. All the novels of Lawrence are more or less autobiographical as they
deal with the events as well as the emotions of his own life but sons and Lovers is
the most autobiographical event of Lawrence’s novels.In a letter written in 1913,
Lawrence has stated some startling facts about women: “It seems to me that the
chief thing about woman who is much of a woman – is that in the long run she is
not be had”Lawrence deplores and criticizes the possessiveness in man-woman
relationship. He thinks that the desire for possessiveness is generally found in
woman, though it may also be found in man. Lawrence believes that the civilized
woman is a great threat to man. She tries to bully and dominate him depriving him
of his individuality and masculinity. He denounces the possessive woman as she
robs man of his instinctive life. D.H. Lawrence had such a staunch faith in male
supremacy as he went to the extent of writing: “as a matter of fact unless a woman
is held by man, safe within the bounds of belief, she becomes inevitably a
destructive force. She can’t help 1erself.... But let a woman loose from the bounds
and restraints of man’s fierce belief in his gods and himself and she becomes a
gentle devil. She becomes subtly diabolic.” At another place he writes: “She ought
to believe in you, and the deep purpose you stand for.”

Sons and Lover’s is a book which tells the story of a man so emotionally
connected to and influenced by his mother that he is unable to form lasting
relationships when he encounters other women. Paul Morel is the limelight of the
novel, and in his life the following women plays their roles.
 The first is I. Morel who is the central character in the novel, who embodies the
over possessive woman. She leaves no space for others in his family to exercise
their choice. She thinks herself superior to other women in the neighborhood.
Thus, she strives hard to reform her husband, Mr. Morel. “The pity was she was
too much his opposite. She could not be content with the little he might be. So in
seeking to make him nobler than he could be, she destroyed him” (p. 56).Mrs.
Morel, the character based on Lawrence’s mother, is involved in the central theme
of the novel namely Oedipus complex or Mother-fixation. She is a religious
woman who is serious and believes in hard work and adherence to a strict code of
morals. I. Morel is romantic by nature. In her teenage years, she had a lover named
John Field. However, he leaves her for a rich widow. He has given I. Morel a copy
of the Bible, which she preserves for her whole life as her property. She meets
Walter Morel at the age of twenty-three: “His cheeks were ruddy, and his red,
moist mouth was noticeable because he laughed so often and so heartily.” Upon
meeting him, she watches him with fascination. She is then attracted to the
smartness and pleasant manners of Mr. Morel and physical attraction leads her to
marry him, but when the attraction fades, the marriage becomes bitter and stormy.
She is delineated as a hard unbending woman whose love ruins the life of her sons
and destroys her husband. It is because her sense of superiority due to her
background that she could not be content with the little she has in her conjugal life.
She tries to reform her husband according to her standards of life, but she destroys
him. Consequently, I. Morel turns away from her husband and invests all her love
and energy in her two eldest sons, William and Paul. Her Pride and Egoism: The
romantic ideas of I. Morel lead to disillusionment. She learns that her husband is a
poor miner who drinks and gambles. I. Morel proves to be an unsympathetic wife.
She herself becomes responsible for her misery. Her sense of superiority destroys
her domestic life. She does not mix with other women as she regards them low and
vulgar. They are common folk and she has come from a higher-middle class
family. She does not accept the life, which a common miner can give her. She
desires for a better life. She does not wish Morel to make his son a miner like him.
She considers her husband inferior to her. She insults him by saying that she will
“wait on a dog at the door first” and then him. She discusses politics, religion and
philosophy with the clergyman in the presence of Mr. Morel. She humiliates him
by doing so. She does not feel sympathy for her husband. It is she who drives her
husband to excessive drinking. She makes him feel alienated in his own home. I.
Morel is a good mother though she does not prove to be a good wife. She loves all
her children like a true mother. She works hard for saving her children from the
ugly and poor life of the miners. She doesn’t want William to become a miner. She
has an ambition in life to give her children good education so that they may get
good jobs. She realizes her ambition. She becomes very happy when William wins
prizes at school. She feels joyful when Paul wins prizes for his paintings. She
supports Paul while going to attend an interview. She feels sad when Annie leaves
after marriage. She feels dejected when William goes to London and mourns
severely for William’s death. She devotes herself to Paul and as he goes into the
world, I. Morel sees him as a reflection of herself. I. Morel, no doubt, has strong
love for her children. However, her love is over-possessive. She hates her husband
as he has deceived her by telling lies. So she turns to her sons, particularly William
and Paul for emotional fulfillment. She makes her sons “husband substitutes” –
though spiritually and not physically. There are many scenes, which show more
than mother-son love. For example, William gives his prizes to I. Morel as a lover
gives to his beloved. Paul gives her flowers. They go to the market and fairs like
lovers. Paul gives her company as if “he were her young man. It is this Oedipus
complex which destroys the lives of William and Paul. They become the victim of
“Mother-fixation”. She has a strong hold on their souls. William cannot marry
Gipsy and died because of his illness. Paul too can neither marry Miriam nor Clara.
Paul himself says that he will not able to marry any woman till his mother is alive.
This comes true. Finally, the special importance of I. Morel’s character is that she
is the portrayal of the author’s mother, Lydia Lawrence. I. Morel resembles
Lawrence’s mother in several respects. Like her, I. Morel comes from a middle-
class, educated and cultural family. She is religious, spiritual and intellectual like
Lawrence’s mother.

Now coming to second women in Paul’s life, Miriam Leivers, She can be called
the heroine of the novel. Miriam is described as a very beautiful young woman.
She has a rosy face, black curly hair and free dark eyes. She was extremely
charming. However, she was not proud of her beauty. Miriam is by nature a very
sensitive girl. She feels miserable and sad at the vulgarity of her surroundings. Her
brothers often humiliate her with their bad attitudes. Miriam finds herself doing
“lowly duties” in the maledominated world. Therefore, she complains: “I’m all day
cleaning what the boys make just as bad five minutes.... Why should I, because I’m
a girl, be kept at home and not allowed to be anything ? What chance have I ?”
(p.191). There is an apparent contradiction in her personality: she wants to have
advantages like men but, at the same time, she hates them. Secondly, Miriam is a
romantic and ambitious girl. She gets lost in daydreaming. This is possible because
of her power of imagination. Lawrence She considers herself “a Walter Scot
Heroine being loved by men with helmets”. However, her brothers often belittle
her and so she considers herself a princess turned into a swine-girl. Miriam is
ambitious too. She has a keen desire for knowledge. She thinks that she would be
respected if she studied hard. The most important feature of Miriam is that she is
sexuality inhibited. She loves Paul only spiritually. She does not like to yield to the
sexual passion of Paul. This fact is symbolized by two incidents. First Miriam
cannot enjoy the hen-pecking. She is afraid of being hurt. Secondly, she hesitates
to swing high on the swing. Both of these events symbolize the sexual act Miriam
is possessive in nature, her sense of insecurity breeds in her possessive attitude to
things. She wishes to grab things. Her over-possessive nature is reflected in her
frenzy. For example, she folds her younger brother in her arms and sways side to
side. Paul feels annoyed at this show of affection. Miriam has a strong hold on the
soul of Paul too. Therefore, I. Morel hates her. We read that Paul allows the loaf of
bread to burn when he is in the company of Miriam. Similarly, Miriam allows
potatoes to be overcooked when she is in the company of Paul. Both feel attracted
to each other. It is the soul’s love. Her love for Paul is also religious. Like her
mother, she is inclined to be mystical. Her love for Paul is so spiritual that it ceases
to be natural. Even when she submits to Paul’s sexual passion, she is not able to
overcome her early inhibitions. She submits to him as if to a sacrifice. She lies
there like an animal for immolation. So Paul feels as if he were sexless or dead.

The other woman in Paul’s life is Clara Dawes. Clara plays a short role in the
novel. She is one of the important women characters in the novel. Clara is a
charming woman with fair skin and full mouth. Her bare arms and fine shaped
body attracts Paul. Paul sketches her arms. Her charm almost tortures him. In short,
Clara is a charming, fascinating and fashionable young woman. Clara is a foil to
Miriam. Unlike her, Clara is not modeled after any real woman. She is really the
product of the novelist’s own imagination. If Miriam represents the spirit, Clara
represents the flesh. If Miriam is sexuality inhibited, Clara is sexually aggressive.
We learn that I. Morel does not hate Clara but she hates Miriam because Mrs.
Morel knows that Miriam loves Paul’s soul. Clara has a typical relationship with
Paul. She is a married woman but she lives away from her husband, Baxter Dawes.
She lives with her old mother. Paul feels sympathy for her poverty and finds a job
for her in his office. It is Miriam herself who introduced Paul to Clara. Clara gives
Paul physical love. But soon she remains unsatisfied by Paul. She realizes that
Baxter is better than Paul. At the factory, Clara keeps aloof from other women
because of her pride. So other women call her the Queen of Sheba. Clara feels
tormented when Paul visits her quarters and discovers her poverty. She also
participates in the movement for sake of women’s emancipation.

There is very little part of Lily (or Gypsy). She is a handsome brunette. Gyp
considers herself to be elite in Gertrude’s home: while she was with the Morels she
queened (the house). She sat and let Annie or Paul wait on her as if they were her
servants. She was beautiful and later her beauty seems to hurt William. She was a
woman who wanted to be always appreciated and praised. She was a a materialistic
person as William says “it’s the fourth pair she’s lost since Christmas”. She feels
humiliated when William tells his mother that she hasn’t read a book in her life
which makes her cry. As William says “she could understand nothing but love
making and chatter. She is a Wessel-brained.” One major aspect of her William
reveals that “she’s very much in love with me now, but if I died, she’d have
forgotten me in three months.” And it also comes as a prophecy too. When
William dies, Gyp doesn’t come to see his dead body. This shows that she isn’t
really caring and sympathetic woman.

Through his characters, Lawrence commented on the condition of England, on

What D.H. Lawrence says is quite in conformity with the Bible which teaches:
"A woman should learn in quietness and full submission. I do not permit a woman
to teach or to have authority over a man; she must be silent ... women will be kept
safe through childbirth, if they continue faith, love and holiness with propriety." 1
Timothy 2:11-15.
Bibliography
 Letters to Henry Savage, Moore, Yale University Library Gazette, xlvi
(1972)
 Lawrence, D.H, Sons and Lovers, 1913
 Hardy, Barbara. “Women in D. H. Lawrence’s Works” D. H. Lawrence:
Novelist, poet, Prophet London: Weidenfield and Nicolson, 1973.
 Cock shut, A.O.J. Man and Woman: A study of Love and the Novel 1740-
1940, London: Collins, 1977.