Lady Chatterley's Lover

**WARNING: This review contains a discussion of the c-word, and I plan to use it. Please don't read this if you do not want to see the word spelled out. Thanks.**This is less a review than an homage to my crazy mother (now I have you really intrigued, don't I?)It was 1983, and I was in my first Catholic school. I'd spent my first six years of school in a public school, but my "behavioral issues" coupled with my lack of growth made me a target for bullies, so my parents were advised to move me to another school where no one knew me.So off I went to the home room of a fallen nun, who'd given up her habit for a family. She wasn't much of a teacher. She was an old school Catholic educator who practiced punitive teaching, which included kicks to the shins, yanking of ears, pulling of hair, and screaming from close range.I kept my head down and tried to blend in with my new surroundings, but my Mother made that difficult from the get go. I was a voracious reader, and she passed on the disease to me. From grade two on she had been recommending great books to me. I was reading everything before most everyone else, but my Mom's recommendation of Lady Chatterly's Lover in my first month of Catholic school was probably her most outrageous and unforgettable recommendation. She bought me a copy at the book store in the mall, and that's where I met one of my favourite words of all time -- cunt. Back in 1983, cunt was not a word in your average child's vocabulary. Sure we'd heard it, and maybe even seen it, but it was not something that was regularly used by kids, and its usage was pretty vague to every 13 year old I knew.But there it was in Lady Chatterly's Lover. It was all over the place. So as I read the story and absorbed the way Lawrence used cunt, his usage became my usage. Lawrence used cunt beautifully; it was not a term of denigration; it was not used to belittle; it was not an insult nor something to be ashamed of; cunt was lyrical, romantic, caring, intimate. And I came to believe that cunt was meant to be used in all these ways. That the poetic use of cunt was the accepted use of cunt, the correct use of cunt, and suddenly cunt was part of my vocabulary. I was thirteen.Now I didn't just start running around using cunt at every opportunity. I did what I always did with new words that I came to know and love. I added them to my vocabulary and used them when I thought it was appropriate.And when I whispered it to Tammy, the girl I had a crush on, a few weeks later, thinking that it was the sort of romantic, poetic language that made women fall in love with their men (I can't remember what I said with it, but I know it was something very much like what Mellors would have said to Constance), she turned around with a deep blush, a raised eyebrow and a "That's disgusting" that rang through the class (I can still see the red of autumn leaves that colored her perfectly alabaster skin under a shock of curly black hair, aaaah...Tammy. Apparently she had a better sense of cunt's societal taboos than I did). Mrs. C--- was on her feet and standing parallel to the two of us in a second, demanding to know what was going on.To her credit, Tammy tried to save me -- sort of. She said "Nothing." Then Mrs. C--- turned on me; I was completely mortified (I'd obviously blown it with the first girl I loved in junior high school), and while I was in this shrinking state, Mrs. C--- demanded to know what was happening and what I had said. I tried to avoid repeating what I had said. I admitted I shouldn't have been talking. I admitted that I should have been working. I tried to divert her attention. But she was a scary lady, and I couldn't help myself. I repeated what I had said -- as quietly as I could -- but as soon as Mrs. C--- heard "cunt" I was finished. That was the moment I knew "cunt" was the catalyst for the whole debacle. Now...I'd known before that the word was taboo, but I didn't think it would generate the response it did. I really thought that Tammy would be flattered. And I certainly didn't expect that I would be dragged to the office by an angry ex-nun. Silly me. I got the strap. It was the first time (although there would be another). Three lashes to the palm of the hand.I didn't use "cunt" in public or private for a long time after that, but my punishment couldn't diminish my love for the word. Lawrence made such and impression on my young mind that neither humiliation nor physical pain could overcome my appreciation of cunt's poetic qualities. To me the word is and always will be a beautiful and, yes, gentle thing.Every time that event was recounted at the dinner table over the years, whether it was amongst family, or with my girlfriends or my future wife, my Mom always got this sly little grin on her face and indulged in a mischievous giggle before refusing to take the blame for me getting the strap. After all, "Who was the one who was stupid enough to use the word, Brad? Not me."I love her response as much as I love the word. And in case you were wondering, my Mom never stopped recommending books to me. She was an absolute kook. I miss her. I can't wait to pass on Lady Chatterly's Lover to my kids...but I think it's going to have to be in grade three if it's going to have the same effect it had on me...hmmm...I wonder how that will go over.

A young woman is torn between the man she married who is disabled by war early after their union and the virile gamekeeper who relieves her from her desperate loneliness. A familar theme, but this version is told impeccably well. Definitely worth the read, but I can't help wondering what happened to the baby.

Another treat. Thanks Mr. Lawrence... Apart from the abstract world of ideas, Lawrence showed his readers that he can also be strongly physical and down to the fleshy earth. A very erotic novel.

I am shocked that I enjoyed this. My father - a non-reader - always held DH Lawrence as his standard for unreadable books. While I certainly love reading more than him, I tend to agree with his assessments to a less passionate degree (writes he says aren't half bad, I love, writers he's dislikes, I enjoy, writers he hates, I dislike, etc.). I really liked this though. It felt so oddly anachronistic - like a modern author *trying* to write a regency-era romance - it created a pleasantly jarring experience. I was so confused the first few scenes - I couldn't fathom when this book took place or was written. I was shocked to find it was in the early days of the Depression.

I picked it up because I was curious to see what one of the so-called sexiest books ever could have going on with it. I was more impressed with the actual story than I was with the sex. It had an excellent running commentary about the destruction of tradition and humanity through industrialization.

I added this over a year ago but for some reason it's recently disappeared from my "read" list!Anyway, I read this twice because one of my modules at university was about D. H. Lawrence. First read was for class, second read was for essay preparation.Found out during the module that I'm not a Lawrence fan, though of all the works of his I read, "Lady Chatterley's Lover" was the best of the bunch.

I heard, it's a book of fame for its sensuality. But in my opinion, rather, it's a book of escaping the despair of the rotten world. Through the world of sensuality, they saw hope.The book starts with rather dismay or low situation, makes you think, the ending has to be lifted up, 'cause the chances are just higher at the other half. Clifford and Connie both were struggling in their settings, or in the chasm between their idealisms and their realities. Both painfully realized how repulsive or disgusting the reality was, both pursuing their ideal "kingdom". Though Clifford started out actively, Connie passively. She was doubting from beginning (not very beginning though, otherwise she wouldn't marry him) that his effort could get him anywhere. At the end, Clifford sank hopelessly in his own helplessness, which was reflected by his strange relationship with Mrs. Bolton. Connie, though, wakened by the ecstasy of sensual world, actively sought after the new relationship between her and Mellors.In one way, Lawrence definitely expressed his view of pure intellectual - cold, dry, lifeless and hopeless - in the character of Clifford, who was intelligent in many ways but totally disconnected from the sensual world, because of his disability. I don't think he meant that a person with disability would lead a lifeless life. He just used Clifford as an experiment to test out his theory, that pure intellectual can't save a wrecked life. Especially, at later part of the book, it described more of Clifford's vacancy of his soul. Like Connie's father said "there is nothing in it". Later he invested his intellectual power into coal mining, despite the success, but it can't even be used to maintain his class "dignity" (What a blow to learn that Connie preferred Mellors to him!)Connie with her instincts, eventually penetrated his intellectual nothingness. Her attitude toward him changed from a little fear and admiration at the beginning to despise and hate at the end. She had much richer world of consciousness than Clifford's, which situated her at superior position at the end (she understood the world of Clifford but not vice versa). The world of consciousness is the spiritual world in my opinion. Though religion wasn't even touched in the whole book. I wonder what was Lawrence's view regarding spiritual and religion.The consciousness of characters in the book was expressed mostly in form of narratives. The narrator penetrated the characters' consciousness in way of omnipotence. The characters themselves sometimes are not even aware of his/her own limitations. This is probably the details I enjoyed the most. The subtleties of every turn of human thoughts, naturally flow with the characters, each in its own cunning way, and inevitable by their circumstances.Example 1:Clifford - "You and I are married, no matter what happens to us, We have the habit of each other. And habit, to my thinking, is more vital than any occasional excitement. The long, slow, enduring thing ...""Connie sat and listened in a sort of wonder, and a sort of fear...The long slow habit of intimacy, formed through years of suffering and patience..."At intellectual level, Clifford probably believed such thing. But at deeper level, he himself was not sure. This was the product of his brain during the moment of its peak performance, which can't be maintained. Connie's reaction was unpredictable, at least to me, until it was spelled out so naturally by the narrator.Example 2:"He thought how handsome she looked, but also he shrank from her...He sat square and well-groomed in his chair, his hair sleek and blond, and his face fresh, his blue eyes pale, and a little prominent, his expression inscrutable, but well-bred. Hilda thought it sulky and stupid, and he waited. He had an air of aplomb, but Hilda didn't care what he had an air of;..."How beautifully the narrator drew the image of Clifford: confident appearance, though low self-esteem inside; longing to impress Hilda, though really afraid to get closer...There were hundreds of these subtle details, sometimes I do feel I had the exactly the same inner workings. Lawrence definitely studied the psychology of his character carefully, since they were so real, and falling to their places so naturally. It was one of the true treasures of the book.Mellors had a pessimistic view of the world through his own sufferings. Connie had an apparent optimistic view of the new relationship. Conflicts would be inevitable, but they were no longer Lawrence's concern. His job was done: raising their hopes. If that hope is another illusion, or isn't strong enough to uphold life's many tragedies, then that's up to other authors to prove or disprove it.But how did the sensual experience change Connie's perspective of life? I still don't have a convincing answer. The best I can get is: people's warmheartedness is just appearance, when relationship is getting closer, more and more ugliness would sink any naively conceived relation-ship, then how do you know the true noble heart? the warmhearted to the core? I guess, through the most intimate act - sex.

Oh boy. More sex and mildly interesting musings on society. I've read fanfiction with better sex in it. I kept chuckling at the penis nicknaming.

At the start I thought, I'm not going to finish this, as I found the story quite slow moving. I'm glad I persevered, and although by today's standards it wouldn't be on a Banned Books List, I can see why it was at the time of publication. This is my first experience of D.H. Lawrence and his writing style slowly grew on me, so much so that by the end I had settled into and enjoyed the slow pace, the characters and the look back at his time and place. It's very well written and I could easily sympathise with all the characters, and appreciate the way they each found themselves trapped.

Pretty tame by today's standards, but Lawrence's is still the language of life and was the language of a revolution in its day. Probably the most banned book ever.

“Sex and a cocktail: they both lasted about as long, had the same effect, and amounted to the same thing.” I was drawn to this book,like many others,due to its notoriety more than anything else having thankfully not had to suffer studying this whilst at school and having read it am convinced that it is only this notoriety which has led to its endurance in the public psyche. Personally I found it rather dull and tedious.OK I get that this book is an outpouring from Lawrence's own unhappy upbringing and is a comment on the class system at the time but this was a class system which was gradually collapsing anyway or at least getting blurred due to the devastating effects of WWI when so many young men,and in particular members of the so called elite,had perished therefore felt that the book was not particularly revolutionary. Whilst the characters were well written I struggled to particularly like any of them,other than probably the exception of Mrs Bolton,all seemed extremely selfish,shallow and insecure in their own way only interested in their own needs and I really could not care what happened to any of them. In fact I felt a certain professional sympathy for Clifford,who despite being a cold fish in his personal life,did at least seem to be striving to find more uses for his coal and thus keep his workers in work and therefore earning.In the end Mellors' and Connie's relationship seems to boil down to being able to orgasm at the same time and I'm not sure that that is really conducive with a real long term relationship. Friendship and common interests are more important or perhaps I've just being doing it wrong all these years. Perhaps the quote at the top should have read champagne rather that cocktail because with that there is a little fizz at first but it soon goes flat rather like this book for me.

Lady Constance Chatterley marries her husband shortly before World War I. He returns from the war paralyzed from the waist down. Their relationship continues to stagnant in the countryside until she has an affair with their gamekeeper, Oliver Mellors. The book was considered incredibly racy it was published in 1928. The full novel wasn’t even published in England until 1960. I decided to read this because it’s one of the most banned books of all time. To me, the novel was a gross simplification of love. Physical love is part of relationships, but it’s not the only element. Lawrence seemed to think that without the physical connection there was no way that Constance and her husband Clifford could ever love each other. Her superficial connection with Oliver never rang true to me. Oliver Mellors’ character was hard to stomach. He’s racist, homophobic, selfish, and quick to lose his temper. The only thing Constance actually has in common with him is their mutual physical attraction. It’s hard to believe Lawrence’s premise that this is the most powerful relationship she can have. It would be more believable if Constance had an affair with him, began to understand the importance of the physical side of relationships and then found someone that satisfied both the physical and mental desires that she had. BOTTOM LINE: It’s a classic and I’m glad I read it, but it’s definitely not a new favorite. Lawrence writes some beautiful passages, but the characters and the plot fell short.

The quintessential banned book and more brilliant, warm, tragic and beautiful for being so. A landmark in English literature.

The last DH Lawrence book I read was Sons & Lovers, a required novel for my grade 12 english class. At the time, I remember saying that I liked it, but found the surface of Lawrence's writing impenetrable (a nice irony for a man so concerned with sexual freedom). I always think kids reading this novel for the sexy bits; but I have to say that once Lady Chatterly actually got with the gamekeeper, that's when I lost interest. I found the negotiations and tension leading up to it more interesting; the post-coital dialogue becomes more pedantic.

I knew, before reading this book, that Lady Chatterley's Lover had a scandalous history, so I figured it must get pretty hot and heavy. But I didn't expect the eloquent, elegant authorship of this book, even including those scandalous sex scenes that caused so much trouble for Lawrence. I was a little bit in awe of Lawrence's writing, but not as much by the story as I wanted to be. Because yes, there is a story around the sex. Lady Chatterley's husband Sir Clifford is a war cripple and the couple have no children. The utter boringness and 'self-importance' of Sir Clifford drives Connie into the arms of other men, which he doesn't really seem to mind as long as its tasteful and he gets an heir which he will then raise as his own. BUT this does not apply to the gamekeeper Oliver Mellors, who Connie inexplicably falls in love with after a couple of stilted conversations and a few sexual encounters she doesn't really get much out of (at least to start with). I didn't really see the attraction, but, y'know, each to their own.It seemed like there should have been more to this story and especially to the end, but after the building to the climax (pun not intended) it just sort of petered away into a half-hearted ending. By that point, I was expecting more from it. Still wasn't too bad of a read to see what caused all the fuss. 

A shocking affair between a frustrated wife and the gamekeeper on her estate is explicitly explored in this beautiful novel. Originally banned as pornography, this novel lives up to the hype surrounding it. You must read it!

I'm a babe in the world of D.H. Lawrence. I was assigned Lady Chatterley's Lover as a college assignment in Brit Lit 203. I read the Cliff Notes. I got a B-minus in the course. And that was forty years ago.Yes, I was the guy who never showed for morning classes, and closed the student pub. And at times, I was even the night watchman. So it should come as no surprise that when I finally got around to reading the book, last week, it was already the next century . A bit late. But better than never. Maybe even a form of a haute snobisme, my preferring to read dead authors AND be taught by dead professors?But now at least I have an authentic and passionate opinion on the novel. D.H.Lawrence's Lady Chatterley's Lover is punk rock, in the finest sense. Sex pistols indeed. Anarchy in the UK - turn it up!. The book had me, using just three power chords: the conflict between classes, the barriers to sexual honesty, and the profound exploitation of the environment by capitalism.These were issues, for Lawrence, in England after the Great War of 1914. They remain issues world-wide to this day. Lawrence, speaking sometimes through the character of Mellors, and sometimes through Lady Chatterley, is prophetic in his pessimism. The gap between the rich and the poor, the powerful and the powerless, has not been addressed by a rise in the overall standard of living in the West. Global consumerism is laying waste to the Arctic, Africa and the Amazon. And, ironically, enormous technical advances in communications media, have only added barriers to honest conversation. Like OMG how much of yourself should you reveal if it might be texted, myspaced, youtubed and there for all, on Google, in perpetuity?It's hard not to love this novel for its underlying courage and outrage. And, its wit. I'm glad I never read it until 2008. In 1968, all my peers were rebelling, each to his or her own banner. Lawrence would have elicited a "So?" from me then. Now, many of my peers drive SUVs, live in McMansions, vote Republican, and kow-tow to evangelicals. Now I understand better, what a rare and brave cri de coeur this novel is.

Radical for its time and, indeed, languishing out of print for more than thirty years, this book explores sex and skims over adultery. I read it many years ago and never felt the urge to read it again. I felt that it said more about the author than its characters.

I can see why this was so controversial in the past, but the language and images are definitely mild by today's standards. A lyrical story of sexual awakening. I would recommend reading this back-to-back with [Their Eyes Were Watching God] by [[Zora Neale Hurston]], another excellent story of sexual awakening.

Sir Clifford Chatterley (partially a self-portrait of author D.H. Lawrence) is a frustrated writer who thinks he knows Everything about Everything, but he is actually an embittered and impotent World War I veteran suffering from PTSD. His wife Connie finds solace in his gamekeeper's hut and in the gamekeeper's bed, discovering The Joy of Sex decades before Alex Comfort coined the term.Here, the prose of Lawrence is occasionally purple, it is occasionally profane, it is occasionally full of nearly incomprehensible dialect. But it's never dull. However, if you laugh whenever you see the words "loins" or "bowels" in connection with human intercourse, you might want to avoid this book!!!

I read this for the 1001 books to read before you die group challenge. The book was known for it's discussions on class systems and social conflict, and not to forget the challenge on censorship. But despite all that I just couldn't find myself liking this one that much.

Started reading this as an e-book from Project Gutenberg but I wanted to make too many notes so I switch to a paper edition and discovered that the e-book was the censored / edited version. Grrrr!*** Kinda / Sorta Spoilers ***There are really two different books to review in the Penguin hardcover -- Lady Chatterley's Lover and then Lawrence's bizarre letter afterward. The novel itself is frustrating, beautiful, a little dry, and passionate. I can see why it was called Lady Chatterley's *Lover* and not "Lady Chatterley". The gamekeeper was a fantastic character - I loved his little speeches, his mixed up dialects, and his stubbornness. Lady Chatterley herself I found pretty boring pretty early. But the gamekeeper kept me reading. And then... you finish the book, and find this defense by D.H. Lawrence written several years after the first edition was published. In some parts, it's brilliant and in other parts, he seems completely, without-a-doubt insane. And then I find myself agreeing with some of the things he wrote and start wondering, "Am I insane, too?"

I did not approve of the morals of the characters in the book.

A more literate than average romance novel. One of the first of its kind, so important, but for this reader at least, banal and uninspiring.

Misogyny abound. Regardless, it's quite hilarious. The first time I read this all I remembered was sex and chickens. This time around I picked up on much more. The narration by John Lee was perfect.

While I liked Lady Chatterley's Lover, it was difficult to keep it in context. The context of Lawrence's novel is 1920's England. The story by today's measure is still good-- it's a little steamy, a little saucy and a little tawdry. Though by 1920's British standards, it is nothing short of scandalous. Therein lies a bump-in-the-road to a full appreciation of the LCL's contribution to literature. Nevertheless, the story is still relevant on certain levels. Sexual expression by women is still something that is viewed with disdain. Differing levels of social acceptance towards female sexuality was one issue Lawrence was railing against-- men with mistresses in proper British society was acceptable, almost expected. But a woman who sought sexual satisfaction from anyone other than her husband was a completely different matter.
The novel is well written and makes the author's point eloquently. But still, I wonder what would have become of the exact same novel had a woman written it in the same time period.

I won't discount this book, since it has had a profound effect on the history of literature, and it's good. But it's not my favorite of Lawrence, nor is it entirely well written. It seems like most of its fame is a result of it being controversial, rather than groundbreaking in a literary sense. It is good, it's just not up there with Sons and Lovers in my list of favorites.

Clifford Chatterley returns from WW1 wheelchair bound, and with his young wife Connie goes to manage Wragby, the family estate, in an industrial area in the english midlands. While initially happily married, Connie's desire for a child gains tacit approval from the sexless Clifford. An unexpected meeting with the estate's game keeper and the ensuing affair awakens Connie to a sexuality she did not know existed.I did not immediately take to the book, but enjoyed it more once the rythm of the story was established It is certainly easy to understand why it created such a stir when originally published

D.H. Lawrence is such an interesting writer that even his failures are worth reading, and Lady Chatterley’s Lover is a bit of a failure. Today, with virulent pornography always a click away, I expected the famous sexy bits of this book to lose their shock, but I did not expect them to be comic. Yet they were, unless you do not find tropes such as “mound of Venus” rather funny. Still, these howlers came as a relief, because Lady Chatterley’s Lover is starkly humorless. Whether describing the miasma of industrialization or the rapacious drive of the clitoris, D.H. Lawrence is in deadly earnest. He shouts from the pulpit, and righteousness can never afford much laughter. So why read it? First and least, the text is an historical landmark in development of the English novel, both for it’s famous sexual content and the even more famous censorship battles it inspired. But historical landmarks are often bores to read, and Lady Chatterley Lover, for all it’s flaws, still engages. Much of it’s allure stems from the profound and maverick strangeness of the author’s mind. By the time Lady was written, decrying the evils of industrialization was common practice. But Lawrence surpassed all his peers in pure rage. Unlike the well-to-do members of the Bloomsbury group, Lawrence was a coalminer’s son who personally witnessed the mines physically and mentally cripple the community of his childhood. Add to this fact his atavistic love of nature, rarely shared by his modernist colleagues, and imagine him watching factories level the forests and pollute the air. It was a shock to me to discover that a seemingly erotic novel turned out so unconditionally angry. And this anger explains in part why Lady still has an edge; the sex may seem silly and tame, but the molten rage beneath it continues to unnerve. Much to his credit, Lawrence did not merely condemn industrial society, he proposed an alternative. Now, his solution, taken in the extreme manner in which he believed in it, is where the book shows its age. “Organic Fucking” is the best summary I can give his vision of redemption. It is the fierce ancestor of the milk toast “Make Love Not War” ethos of the 1960s. “Mound of Venus” references aside, I believe Lawrence would ultimately reject the willed naiveté of the hippy movement; he was too discerning, too acquainted with struggle and sacrifice, to merely hold up the flower and bliss out. But both Lawrence and the flower children drew on adolescent fantasies in order to overthrow grim realities. Like all utopian visions, it ultimately failed. Lawrence shares this fate with another articulate and outraged enemy of industrialization, John Ruskin. Yet while their respective solutions failed, Lawrence and Ruskin’s fiery salvos against modernity cannot be easily dismissed, nor can their willingness, at great personal sacrifice, to try and build a better world than the one they saw around them. But Lawrence’s fighting spirit does not mark the beginning and end of his appeal. While even in his more successful works his writing is uneven, with clods of purple pose choking the flow of the page, at is best it is nigh perfect: sensuous yet limpid, reaching depths of emotion that seldom surface on the cool waters of English prose. At times he manages to combine dazzling complexity of language with a irresistible primitivism of feeling, like a frightening ancient and barbaric statue wrapped in exquisite lace. Once more, his insight into the relationships of men and women are unsurpassed in all of English literature. No one has written on that ancient subject with such honesty, observation, and intelligence. And this is the real reason that I still enjoy Lawrence, for all of his flaws. As I write this I have been married to a woman for five years, and I hope for many years to come. Lawrence helps me make sense, and ultimately helps me better appreciate, this wonderful, frightening, protean, beloved, despairing, baffling, joyous, mercurial bond that is a cornerstone of my life.

I've loved modernist fiction for a long time, but I've had a love-hate relationship with D.H. Lawrence for about as long. Lady Chatterley's lover is the best Lawrence I've ever read. Yes, you can still find what I think of as his bad habits there: his tendency to describe everything using opposites, his obsession with vitality which often seems, as someone else put it, "a sick man's dream of health," his obvious disdain for many of his characters and their choices. But all of these tendencies are reined in here: even his tendency toward repetition comes off as lyrical rather than merely trying. I can enthusiastically recommend it to people who don't much like D.H. Lawrence. What's most delightful about "Lady Chatterley" is that, considering a book that's supposedly about an intense, erotic affair between two people, it's surprisingly wide-ranging. One of the things that makes this book work is, oddly enough, is how carefully Lawrence crafts its temporal and physical setting. Beyond Constance and Oliver's relationship, we get a clear-eyed description of the generalized despair that followed the end of the First World War, a pitiless description of the British artistic scene, a careful transcription of the Derby dialect, and a look destructive effects of the coal industry on Lawrence's beloved British countryside that's simultaneously regretful and buzzing with dark energy. His descriptions of both the main characters' erotic adventures and the lush woods that they have them in are truly beautiful, there are passages where everything in the book seems to pulse with sensuality and life. For all his opinions about the state in which he found the world, I can't think of too many writers who were more interested in writing the body than Lawrence was. This novel might owe its notoriety to its four-letter words and its explicitness, but it also communicates the physicality of both sex and mere being exceptionally well. The paralyzed Clifford is sort of given short shrift here -- one imagines that he's got a body, too, though Lawrence depicts him as largely inert. Also, even while he praises the joy of sexual congress, Lawrence seems to have a lot of ideas about exactly how men and women should and shouldn't have sex. In the final analysis, though, seeing as it was produced by a writer who sometimes comes off as bitter and spiteful about the modern world, "Lady Chatterley" seems like a surprisingly optimistic argument for romantic and physical love. This may be especially true of its lovely final pages, where Constance and Oliver plan out a future that emphasizes the rhythms of nature, their love, and their truest selves. A difficult book from a difficult writer, but certainly worth the effort.