Universität Würzburg

Neuphilologisches Institut / Anglistik

Wintersemester 2007 / 2008

Proseminararbeit:

Civilisation, marriage and tenderness in D.H.

Lawrence′s novel Lady Chatterley′s Lover

Proseminar: Pastoral Novels

10.04.2008

von

Katrin Daum

Englisch / Französisch

2. Semester

Contents

1

Introduction 3

2

Civilisation 3

2.1

The First World War 3

2.2

The Class System 4

2.3

Industrialisation 6

3

Marriage 8

4

Tenderness 10

4.1

Connie and her Lover in Germany, Michaelis and Clifford 10

4.2

Connie and Mellors 11

5

Conclusion 13

6

Bibliography 14

2

1 Introduction

When the first version of Lady Chatterley′s Lover was published in 1926, the readers

had been shocked, because it was about sex. Since then there have been various speculations,

books and articles about if there was more to this book than sex ­ and there certainly is.

The term paper concentrates on three main aspects: civilisation, marriage and

tenderness. I chose three points of criticism of society, namely the war, the class system and

industrialisation. In the chapter `marriage′, I decided to focus mainly on the Chatterley′s

marriage and the relation between Connie and Mellors, though also the couples Ted and Ivy

Bolton and Mellors and Bertha Coutts come up shortly. For the last point in this term paper, I

grouped the aspects of Connie′s relations before she had met Mellors and her relation with

him. In this last chapter, I tried not to give too many examples to show in which way the two

lovers behave tenderly, but I rather attempted to give an overview over their relationship and

the ramifications of tenderness for them.

2 Civilisation

2.1 The First World War

The consequences of the First World War for Constance Chatterley were not only a

husband, Clifford, who was physically paralysed from the waist downwards and impotent, but

whose soul was also damaged. At first glance, everything appeared `normal′: Clifford was a

famous author, liked receiving friends at Wragby Hall, the family seat, enjoyed having

conversations with them and his wife, and was fond of going out for a walk in his motor-chair

in the nearby wood. But in one of their discussions, Connie noticed

[...] one of the great laws of the human soul: that when the emotional

soul receives a wounding shock, which does not kill the body, the soul seems

to recover as the body recovers. But this is only appearance. It is, really, only

the mechanism of reassumed habit. Slowly, slowly the wound to the soul

begins to make itself felt, like a bruise which only slowly deepens its terrible

ache, till it fills all the psyche. And when we think we have recovered and

forgotten, it is then that the terrible after-effects have to be encountered at their

worst. (49)1

For her, at the age of 23, it was not easy to handle this situation as she had to face it

everyday and there was nothing to distract her at Wragby Hall ­ except the conversations with

Clifford′s friends which soon started to bore her, too.

1 All the numbers given in brackets after quotations refer to the number of the page in the primary text:

Lawrence, D. H.:

Lady Chatterley′s Lover

. London: Penguin Classics, 2006.

3

It seemed to her that "[a]ll the great words [...] were cancelled for her generation:

love, joy, happiness, home, [...]." (62) She suffered, because she failed to live happily with

her husband, inwardly searching for the meaning of her life without yet knowing it. Lawrence

gives the explication for her sentiments himself: "It is the day after."2 Connie′s generation

was the one who survived the First World War and who had to deal with the after-effects of it.

Even the very beginning of the novel tells us that "[o]urs is essentially a tragic age [...]." (5)

Nevertheless, Connie will find her true love Mellors, whereas Clifford is going to be

abandoned by his wife. So when the novel develops, it becomes clear that he is ­ regarding

interpersonal relations ­ actually the tragic figure.

On the one hand, one could lay all the blame for Clifford′s destiny in the hands of the

war, but this would be too easy. He′s certainly not the poor figure that doesn′t know how to

live on, as becomes clear when his person developed with Mrs Bolton′s help. But who knows

how the Chatterley′s marriage would have evolved without the war? Perhaps they would have

lived happily together until the end of their days. But for Lawrence there would have been no

necessity to write about a happy couple. He wanted to criticize the war and its consequences

for human lives. In Doris Lessing′s eyes,

Lady Chatterley′s Lover

is even "one of the most

powerful anti-war novels ever written."3

2.2 The Class System

Clifford, as the owner of the collieries in Tevershall, was responsible for the workers.

His idea was, that the aristocracy "has given the colliers all they have that′s worth having: all

their political liberty, and their education, such as it is, their sanitation, their health-conditions,

their books, their music, everything." (181)

On the one hand, he felt superior to them, as he was a member of the upper class. He

had "power" (108) over them. In his eyes, "they are not men. They are animals [...]" (182)

and "he saw them as objects rather than men" (15). "The masses have been ruled since time

began, and till time ends, rules they will have to be." (183) His duty was to rule them and to

give them work. Apart from that he didn′t care for them.

On the other hand, "he was just a bit frightened of the vast hordes of middle and

lower-class humanity, and of foreigners not of his own class." (10) This could be explained

by the fact that he was crippled and the workers were physically in better condition than he

was. Perhaps it had even something to do with him not being able to go wherever he would

2 Lawrence, David Herbert. "A Propos of `Lady Chatterley′s Lover′." In: Lawrence, David Herbert.

Lady
Chatterley′s Lover

. London: Penguin Classics, 2006.

3 Lessing, Doris: "Introduction." In: Lawrence, David Herbert.

Lady Chatterley′s Lover

. London: Penguin

Classics, 2006. P. XXI.

4