The Return Of The Body

Women in Love (1921) is D. H. Lawrence's most well-known work. It was written during the First World War, a war that put the whole European Civilization at stake. The novel examines the problems of civilization and explores the meaning of Life. As one of the greatest Modernist classics, Women in Love is an experimental novel. By adopting a unique literary form (constructed like a long poem) and profound symbolism, it gave expressions to the essential problems of western culture such as mind, spirit, rationalism, consciousness, and language, etc. Lawrence placed a great importance on the Body in his philosophy. His praise and emphasis on the Body (physical/flesh factor)actually reconsidered the spirit/body problem in a totally different way in contrast to Plato and Descartes. They believed that the spirit comes before the body, which belongs to spirit/body dualism. The novel offers a new perspective on the philosophical and moral dilemma caused by this dualist way of thinking.This thesis is to investigate the body narrative of Women in love and interpret the specific meaning of Body in Lawrence's philosophy.In the light of contemporary body theories, the essay reveals the real significance behind the novel's "criticism of industrial civilization".Chapter one analyses the meaning of body in terms of narrative mode. The narrative function of body is aroused through Lawrence's special use of body rhetoric. Lawrence's experiment with language(which invented a new type of bodily language) reveals the efforts of returning body back into language and consciousness. Chapter two explores the relationship between the novel and European philosophy, culture, and mainstream values, which reveals that the ideas of spirit, rationalism, will, and power in European system of thought has killed the Body and Life. It exposes the immorality and morbid state of the age under the cloak of reason and civilization. At the same time, it also examines the relationship between mind and body; between self and body; between soul and body. Chapter three focuses on the revival of the Body. It achieves a revival through de-socialization of body(nudity and divorce with the patriarchal family), getting rid of the bondage of civilization, and returning to nature. Outside the emancipation of the individual body, Lawrence insists on the "relatedness" of body(create a close intimacy between each other and refuse isolation), in the organic relation with the world(a huge body in theory), the isolation of body is smashed and the creativity of Life is initiated.