D.H. Lawrence Sons and Lovers (1913)
Sons and Lovers was Lawrence's third novel and first proper chart topper, with the general consensus seeming to hold that this was Dave finally getting right everything which had been wrong with The Trespasser - or if not the general consensus, then I've definitely read such a claim made somewhere or other. I'd probably say yes and no in so far as that he went on to write better - at least from what I can remember - and The Trespasser isn't anything like so poor as its reputation seems to imply.
Sons and Lovers is loosely autobiographical, being a thinly veiled account of Lawrence growing up in Eastwood, his family life, then relationships with women analogous to Jessie Chambers and Frieda Weekley - all of which is complicated by his strong emotional attachment to his mother. This aspect has meant that Sons and Lovers tends to be discussed as an Oedipal novel, but as with much of what Lawrence wrote, that which he describes is often too complex in its detail to be well suited to such labels, which is presumably part of the reason for him writing; and the suggestion of him eventually hating and resenting his overpowering matriarch really does this book a disservice, reducing everything to primary colours. Along similar lines, Lawrence's sexuality has often been subject to debate, and those who take an interest in such matters will possibly notice that, as young men go, Paul Morel of Sons and Lovers could hardly be described as priapic, but nor does he seem particularly effeminate. Sometimes glib description doesn't always work.
I'm not sure whether this was necessarily something of which Lawrence was conscious, or is simply part of a pattern I've tended to notice of late, but there's a serious gulf between language and the reality it attempts to describe, and Sons and Lovers is interesting for the reason that attempts to reduce it to descriptions of relationship dynamics inevitably end up describing something which isn't this novel. Instead, the reader is immersed in emotional and sensual currents which form the narrative without ticking boxes, naming names, or fossilising the possibilities of where the tale could go with the introduction of absolutes. This also means that the book is probably much longer than it would need to be were it a simple delivery system for the ideas it proposes, because the only way to faithfully record the relationships it describes are as currents within a much larger whole; which is why The Trespasser seems a little snappier in some respects. In other words, there are points at which it's difficult to tell whether all of the gushing will amount to anything, although this aspect is a necessary part of the experience; and for what it may be worth, that experience is ultimately intensely moving and very rewarding in ways which few writers achieve without either sentiment or villains.
Sons and Lovers was Lawrence's third novel and first proper chart topper, with the general consensus seeming to hold that this was Dave finally getting right everything which had been wrong with The Trespasser - or if not the general consensus, then I've definitely read such a claim made somewhere or other. I'd probably say yes and no in so far as that he went on to write better - at least from what I can remember - and The Trespasser isn't anything like so poor as its reputation seems to imply.
Sons and Lovers is loosely autobiographical, being a thinly veiled account of Lawrence growing up in Eastwood, his family life, then relationships with women analogous to Jessie Chambers and Frieda Weekley - all of which is complicated by his strong emotional attachment to his mother. This aspect has meant that Sons and Lovers tends to be discussed as an Oedipal novel, but as with much of what Lawrence wrote, that which he describes is often too complex in its detail to be well suited to such labels, which is presumably part of the reason for him writing; and the suggestion of him eventually hating and resenting his overpowering matriarch really does this book a disservice, reducing everything to primary colours. Along similar lines, Lawrence's sexuality has often been subject to debate, and those who take an interest in such matters will possibly notice that, as young men go, Paul Morel of Sons and Lovers could hardly be described as priapic, but nor does he seem particularly effeminate. Sometimes glib description doesn't always work.
I'm not sure whether this was necessarily something of which Lawrence was conscious, or is simply part of a pattern I've tended to notice of late, but there's a serious gulf between language and the reality it attempts to describe, and Sons and Lovers is interesting for the reason that attempts to reduce it to descriptions of relationship dynamics inevitably end up describing something which isn't this novel. Instead, the reader is immersed in emotional and sensual currents which form the narrative without ticking boxes, naming names, or fossilising the possibilities of where the tale could go with the introduction of absolutes. This also means that the book is probably much longer than it would need to be were it a simple delivery system for the ideas it proposes, because the only way to faithfully record the relationships it describes are as currents within a much larger whole; which is why The Trespasser seems a little snappier in some respects. In other words, there are points at which it's difficult to tell whether all of the gushing will amount to anything, although this aspect is a necessary part of the experience; and for what it may be worth, that experience is ultimately intensely moving and very rewarding in ways which few writers achieve without either sentiment or villains.
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