RELATIONS OF DOMINANCE AND EQUALITY IN D. H. LAWRENCE

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extreme splits of soul/body. 'Balance' at this early stage .is
quite out of the question.
And related to this is the pattern
of the male in early Lawrence.
Later on there is the rise of
the allegorical dark blood-conscious hero.
But here the males
are spiritual and 'dreaming'.
Later on, too, the male
protagonists tend to be 'fair', not dark — like Will Brangwen,.
or Gerald or Birkin.
It could be that these characters are
realistically complex — in comparison with Lawrence's later
creations, who are simply the personification of the male
genitals.
There seems to be a pattern though: the early fair
males get dominated by the fair women — or destroyed, like
Siegmund.
But the later dark males dominate the fair women
(like Gipriano and Kate) r or at least that is the way Lawrence
wants to push the story.
Siegmund is surely the most adolescent,
docile and masochistic protagonist in Lawrence.
The temptation
of the hero to commit suicide drops out of Lawrence's novels
after Women in Love.
It is characteristic of his earlier
protagonists: George in The White Peacock,
Siegmund, Paul Morel
and Gerald Crich,
The women, on the other hand, never really
change, with the possible exception of Ursula.
From the
beginning to end, from Helena to Kate, they are mental,
spiritual, willful and domineering — based on Mrs Morel, the
strong and powerful Magna Mater.
Only the author's attitude
towards them really changes.