Family: working class: his
father was a coal miner (illiterate, drunk but generous and full of
vitality): his mother was a school teacher (middle class and cultural
background) unhappy
marriage and continuous tensions.
Education: he studied at Nottingham high school (3 years) thanks to a
scholarship, then at university (he became a
teacher in 1908).
Jobs: at 16 he was a clerk in a factory and
was a teach 818g64i er, he becomes also a poet and a novelist and essayist.
Health: he suffered from
pneumonia which would eventually lead to tuberculosis and to a premature
death.
Love: he had an intense emotional tie with his
mother who influenced his love relationship; Jessie Chambers (Miriam in
"Sons and Lovers") encouraged him to write; Frieda von Richthofen (the
German lover) they fled to Germany
and later married.
War: he was suspected of being a spy; he was
also criticized because of his wife's nationality a shocking
experience for him.
Travels: he travelled a lot to
look for peace and happiness to Italy
(Sardinia, Sicily,
Tuscany), Ceylon,
Australia, U.S.A., Mexico,
and France.
Politics: he did not approve the
war and for this reason he was also persecuted in Italy
where he showed some Sympathy for the new fascists ideas.
Features and themes
He suffered from a sense of alienation and rejection such as many
20th century writers.
Criticism: he used his works to
express his criticism of modern civilization with its cities and machines.
(He chose for many of his works the coal district where he was born: Nottingham shire).
Prose of nature and genuine country-life (Lawrence = Wordsworth) the feeling of
English Provincial life all his stories are evoked for situation,
atmosphere, sensuous evocation of nature.
Use of dialect: like Hardy, Lawrence recognized
the possibilities for song and authenticity in his dialect deep
Englishness of Lawrence.
Sex: he advocated the liberation of the
suppressed instincts and the "Wisdom of blood". Similarly to Blake, Lawrence was
sensitive to the obscure forces that, unknown woman, control the great
movements of humanity. The only response to modernization and
mechanization was to be found in human relationship and sex. Sex is a
source of vitality, sex without loves proves only a sterile, empty experience,
which gives no joy, only through love that sex can turn into the highest
moment of full self. Realization an in a perfect fusion with the universe instincts
against intellect.
Individualism: thanks to the influence
of Schopenhauer and Nietzsche, he firmly believed in vitalism and
individualism. Both philosophers saw the irrational as the source of
vitality, exuberance and action. He believed also a deep sense of
individuality against middle classes or the mediocrity of the masses awareness of
the clash between class consciousness and the individual.
Woman: he considered woman
only an instrument for mankind's happiness. His female characters are
often sensitive girls who are aware of their partners' supremacy man - woman
relationship.
Style
He avoided the stream of consciousness technique and employed the
traditional omniscient narrator, using the limited point of view of the
protagonists. A prose which can be considered prolix and repetitive but
also genuine and spontaneous he did not share
Joyce's view of fiction.
Autobiography: a lot of his works are
autobiographies. Oedipus complex is present in "Sons and Lovers" (Mrs
Morel and Paul), family life, frustrated ambition, adolescent sexuality,
feeling of English provincial life, cultural upbringing, anti-modernism,
male domination, the revival of ancient rites in modern life, liberation
of contemporary man from sexual and social taboos.
