When I was aged 20-21, I was very strongly attracted by DH Lawrence's novel, Women in Love; and I have been re-listening to it in the excellent audio-book version read by Ruth Golding, and available free at Librivox.
I am only around half-way through, and there have been some excellent chapters so far, and there are some more to come, that I recall - although I also remember the the novel ends badly.
What WiL has that appealed to me is obvious: it is written from a full recognition of the horroribleness and despair-inducing experience of alienation and materialism. It yearningly aspires to - although does not achieve, such a possibility being excluded by the nature of reality, as well as Lawrence's assumptions - the romantic ideal of a life lived with full participation, and engagement.
The protagonists spend a good deal of the time having deep conversations and intense experiences; which is exactly what I most liked and sought in late adolescence! Indeed, there is perhaps more of this in WiL than in any other fiction I have encountered.
The thing moves slowly, there is a good deal of incantatory deliberate repetition - and sometimes it is dull, almost grinding to a halt. I suspect that I might nowadays find it harder to get-through reading with my eyes, than to hear it well-read.
But where Women in Love succeeds - which is quite often! - Lawrence makes a tremendous impact; with very vivid, absorbing, and memorable scenes.
Note: My recommendation is a case of: people who like this sort of thing may find this the sort of thing they like.
2 comments:
I was very drawn to DH Lawrence when I was still an agnostic and reacting against the modern world. But I found that, while I appreciated the atmosphere of his books, I couldn't really remember anything that happened in them. I think I have read Woman in Love and I literally don't remember any of the episodes in it. I don't have even the faintest memory of the plot. Admittedly it was about twenty years ago.
On the other hand, "Piano" is one of my favourite poems, and inevitably reduces me to tears.
@Mal - Except for odd excerpts; I have not read DHL since I was 21, and then it was only WiL that I liked, of those I tried - I couldn't finish Rainbow or Chatterley which were the only others attempted, as I recall.
My sister studied his poetry in her Eng Lit degree, and I read some of them in her Penguin anthology; but they did not make much of an impact.
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