Life Goes On. Review on Sons and Lovers - D. H. Lawrence

Life Goes On

Life goes on even after worst of catastrophes is D.H. Lawrence’s conclusion. This novel is a psychological exhibition, an exhibition which puts before us the heights of psycho fancy, the varying moods of dejection and also giving us the distinction between need and love, between love and sex and love and communion, from the author’s own experience- the novel is largely autobiographical. It is the story of his Mother’s married life at focus, says Jessie Chambers in her book “D.H. Lawrence: A Personal Record. Lawrence himself wrote about the novel and gave a very broad outline as how his novel could be different:

It follows the idea of a woman of character and refinement (Much like Gertrude Morel) goes into the lower class and has no satisfaction in her own life – she has had a passion for her husband, so the children are born of passion, and have heaps of vitality. But as her sons grow up she selects her sons lovers – first the eldest, then the second (Paul) [She fails to be satisfied by her poor and ill-mannered husband]. These sons are urged into life by their reciprocal love of their mother – urged on and on. But when they come to manhood, they can’t love because their mother is the strongest power in their lives, and holds them. As soon as young men come in contact with women, there’s a split, the split kills the first son (William). The second son (Paul) leaves his soul in his mother’s hands (though he is in love with another woman) and go for passion, but the split disturbs him. Unconsciously the mother realizes what the matter is and begins to die. The son, in the end is naked of everything and drifts towards death, but Art rescues him – his passion for art lives on. – A note of Optimism.

Oedipus Complex, the intricacies that form a pattern of a man and a woman’s thinking, independent of their relationships – I mean a man is a man before he is a father and woman is a woman before she is a mother – may be we ought see Gertrude as a woman and Paul as a man- may be the secret of the World lies in here – an insipid truth.