In this course, we will study the life and works of D. H.
Lawrence, one of the most controversial novelists of the
twentieth-century. Born in 1885,
Lawrence wrote during the Modernist period of British literature, along side
such writers as T. S. Eliot, Ezra Pound, and James Joyce, and Virginia
Woolf. Although his novels, short
stories, essays, and criticism conform in some fundamental ways to the
Modernist tradition, more obviously D. H. Lawrence stands radically apart. Unlike the works of many of his
contemporaries, Lawrence’s novels are characterized by strong plot lines and
well-developed characters; also unlike his contemporaries, they take strong
positions against political and social issues of the time. The ideas that permeate his fiction are anti-industrial,
politically anti-feminist, and even anti-democratic. His last novel, Lady Chatterley’sLover, was banned in the Britain and the United
States for obscenity. Lawrence’s larger
philosophy, emerging out of a complex metaphysic of sex and bodily touch, is
integrated into his fictions to produce immense, extraordinary, and more often
than not, infuriating ideas. As a strong
feminist, I am often repelled by his philosophical assumptions about the
relations between men and women. At the
same time, I find his novels extradordinary and among the greatest ever written. His women characters are strong, complex,
independent, and enduring—far more so, I would argue, than those of his
contemporary, Viriginia Woolf. In this
class, we explore all these amazing contradictions as we read the major novels,
novellas, short stories, poetry, and critical essays of this great, and often
maddening, twentieth-century writer.
Required Texts (all
by D. H. Lawrence)
Sons and Lovers
The Rainbow
Women in Love
The Plumed Serpent
Lady Chatterley’s Lover
Novellas: The Fox, The Ladybird, The Captain’s Doll, Love Among the Haystacks
Selected Short Stories
Selected Poetry
Selected
Criticism
Course Requirements
One 4-5-page paper
One 8-10-page paper
Final Exam