“Well, I think this is my third attempt at a classic and I'm still not feeling any fonder of them. I'm positive that there are many insights that one is supposed to get from reading this novel and I'm also positive they all flew right over my head. I have to admit to skimming over some of the more dreary and draggy parts that just went on and on but didn't accomplish anything-I know naughty me but it couldn't be helped.
I do think the premise of the story is good. Connie is married to Clifford who was hurt in the war and confined to a wheelchair. Connie, being a young woman, starts to realize that she's missing a lot in terms of being loved by a man, both physically and mentally. Not to mention that she wants children and this is something that Clifford will never be able to give her although he says that if she were to get pregnant with another man's child he would raise it as his own and it would be his heir.
So, Connie embarks upon one affair that leaves her upset and empty and she becomes even more depressed. After a while she comes in contact with the game-keeper, Mellors, and falls in love with him, has an affair and becomes pregnant. She has become disgusted with anything and everything to do with Clifford and doesn't want to be with him at all anymore. She leaves on a trip with her sister with intentions of never returning. She asks Clifford for a divorce, which he denies. So, Mellors ends up working on some farm in the end and waiting for Connie to come to him or at least that's what I understood to be happening.
I can see why this novel would have been banned back in the days of 1928 although I disagree with banning books on any level. My thoughts are if you find the material offensive, don't read the book. However, there is a fair amount of bad language in this book and fairly explicit sexual content. I'm not easily offended and truthfully I found some of Lawrence's descriptions of things downright amusing.
There were pieces of Lawrence's writing that I really liked-he is very descriptive with all things. In this section Connie is having a little spat with Clifford and she is thinking to herself:
'He seemed to sit there like a skeleton, sending out a skeleton's cold grizzly will against her. Almost she could feel the skeleton clutching her and pressing her to its cage of ribs'.
This was just an amazing play on words in my opinion.
So, ultimately I didn't love it but I didn't hate it either.
http://peekingbetweenthepages.blogspot.com/2008/09/lady-chatterleys-lover-by-dh-lawrence.html”
Dar S wrote this review Friday, October 17 2008.
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