The Free-Range Bookclub
Bookclubbers without boundaries in Nelson, New Zealand
Lady Chatterley’s Lover – D H Lawrence
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Chosen by Suzy
A working-class man has an affair with an upper-class woman
♥ “D.H. Lawrence wrote Lady Chatterley’s Lover in 1920 amidst much controversy over its content, mainly a married woman’s affair with her gardener in order to give her war paralysed husband an heir. This type of love and natural passion as salvation in a prim society was not looked upon favourably in the 1920s. Neither was Lawrence’s experimental with choice four-letter words, resulting in the privately published book being censored in both the UK and US.
“The third version of the novel was not published in the United States for thirty-one years; it reached the bookshelves even then only after a series of court battles and much public debate. The ensuing publicity over its release meant the book became a best seller some thirty-odd years after it was written.”
Ours is essentially a tragic age, so we refuse to take it tragically. The cataclysm has happened, we are among the ruins, we start to build up new little habitats, to have new little hopes. It is rather hard work. There is now no smooth road into the future: but we go round, or scramble over the obstacles. We’ve got to live, no matter how many skies have fallen.
“We agreed the controversy over this book was its appeal, but obviously reading this book for the first time nearly 90 years after it was written, when such stories are now commonplace, meant the shock factor as we imagined it was not present. However, we appreciate how this content was risque for its time, and that its mere existence paved the way for writers that followed Lawrence.
“But it was a great romance, filled with angst and passion, and something we did all enjoy.”
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Published 1928
Tipografia Giuntina
352 pages
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