D.H. Lawrence Essay, Research Paper

An English novelist and poet, D.H. Lawrence was born September 11, 1885, in Nottingham, England. He was the son of a coal miner and a school teacher. His mother, the school teacher, was socially superior. She constantly tried to alienate her children from their father. The difference in social status between his parent?s was a recurrent motif in Lawrence?s fiction. David Herbert was ranked among the most influential and controversial literary figures of the Victorian Period. In his more than forty books, Lawrence celebrated his vision of the natural, whole human being, opposing the modern society. This opposition of society was used to write books, stories, poems of the heightened sensation and emotion he felt. D.H. Lawrence believed in organic writing.

Most of Lawrence?s writing reflected nature. The nature in his book came from his own experiences he had while traveling abroad with his wife or just on the nature of where he grew up. His most original poetry, published in Birds, Beasts, and Flowers, flowed from his own experience of nature in the southwestern U.S. and the Mediterranean region. Also, the most significant of his early fiction, Sons and Lovers, dealt with life in a mining town. Another

wonderful example of the nature in D.H. Lawrence?s writing would come from The Shadow in the Rose Garden. In this book, the images he has given to a person, make it seem like they really are there. "She closed her sunshade and walked slowly among the many flowers. All around were rose bushes, big banks of roses, then roses hanging or tumbling from pillars, or roses balanced on the standard bushes." The nature in his books truly surrounds a person.

His writing contained heightened sensation. D.H. Lawrence liked to leave his reader?s hanging on to the moment, to continue reading to find out what would happen next. In the story The Shadow in the Rose Garden, readers may become filled with an air of sensation as they read of the relationship between the woman and her old lover. She is visiting an old courting place of the lover she thought was dead. In meeting him she is filled with horror because he is not the same man she once loved "Seeing his hands, with the ring she knew so well upon the little finger, she felt as if she were going dazed. The whole world was deranged. She sat unavailing. For his hands, her symbols of passionate love, filled her with a horror as they rested now on his strong thighs." Also an example of this heightened sensation would be in one of his most notorious novels, Lady Chatterly?s Lover. This book was filled with the sensations between a member of nobility and her husband?s gamekeeper. It was also tabooed for it?s sex words and sexual liberation. Another example that was also tabooed, yet showed heightened sensation, would be Women in Love,

which explored the relationships between men and women. Many of his works created a heightened sensation to keep the reader involved.

David Herbert Lawrence?s work showed much emotion. Again, much emotion between the characters in his books and poems were used to keep readers interested. He would write stories to evoke the wholeness of man. The Rocking Horse Winner is a great example of the emotion he wrote of. In this story, the boy Paul, becomes filled with emotion as he rode on his rocking horse. He wanted to be lucky for his family. He wanted his mother to truly love him and not feel ashamed of the family she had. "It?s Malabar!? he screamed, in a powerful, strange voice. ?It?s Malabar!? His eyes blazed at her for one strange and senseless second, as he ceased urging his wooden horse." The burst of emotion from the boy brought nothing from the mother, for she was truly stone-hearted. The emotion created an atmosphere for the reader, so that they continue

to read on.

Organic writing was a big part of Lawrence?s work. Heightened sensation, the reflection of nature, and much emotion were intertwined into every book, story, or poem he wrote. These themes of his organic writing came from his own day-to-day experiences in the world. Such a theme came from the alienation between his parents. Many people had their own opinions of the type of writing David Herbert did. The controversy in his writing ranged from: "charming, wise, and sympathetic" to "tortured, sick, and filled with hatred." D.H. Lawrence had consumption from early in his life. He would not admit to it. He continued to write until the time of his death on March 2, 1930.

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