D.H. Lawrence (1885–1930) was an English writer and poet. In his writing he grappled mainly with the dehumanising effects of modernity and industrialisation. Lawrence’s works explore issues such as sexuality, emotional health, vitality, spontaneity, and instinct. His well-known books include Sons and Lovers, The Rainbow, Women in Love, and Lady Chatterley’s Lover. Lawrence’s opinions earned him many enemies and he had to suffer official persecution, censorship, and misrepresentation of his creative work throughout the second half of his life, much of which he spent in voluntary exile. At the time of his death, his public reputation was that of a pornographer who had squandered his gifts. E.M. Forster, in an obituary notice, challenged this view, describing him as ‘the greatest imaginative novelist of our generation.’The respected literary critic,F.R. Leavis, also praised his artistic integrity and moral seriousness.
“She had borne so long this cruelty of belonging to him and not being claimed by him.” Sons and Lovers (1913) is a semi-autobiographical novel by renowned English writer D.H. Lawrence.This story of a working-class family revolves around Paul Morel, a young artist who is deeply attached to his mother, Gertrude. His relationship with his mother towers over his romances with Miriam Leivers, his repressed, religious girlfriend, and Clara Dawes, a mature and free-spirited woman.The characters of the alcoholic miner father, and the mother, who resists him in the novel, are said to be modelled on Lawrence’s parents.The older brother,William, who dies young in the novel mirrors Lawrence’s brother Ernest, who passed away. Sons and Lovers is an astute and impactful psychological study of familial bonds, passion, love, and desire. Many critics consider it an Oedipal novel whose theme has been influenced by Sigmund Freud’s controversial theory of sexual desire and the Oedipus complex.
