RELATIONS OF DOMINANCE AND EQUALITY IN D. H. LAWRENCE

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Will is an artist and his concern is with wood carving.
In his art he feels like a master because he can manipulate the
chisel as he likes.
However, his woodcarving contains a special
feature very peculiar to Will: it is immature and unfinished.
One of his carvings, the creation of Adam and Eve, shows Will's
vision of religion.
His Adam seems to depend entirely on God
"and Eve, a small vivid, naked female shape, was issuing like a
flame towards the hand of God, from the torn side of Adam" (p.120).
The point here is the woman's dependence on the man for
proximity to God. Eve is also unripe which implies Will's idea
that women are always to be frail creatures.
Anna later on
questions this in Will because she does not accept this
dependence shown by Eve towards Adam and Eve's lack of power in
relation to God.
This happens after her marriage to the young
man.
When Anna cannot tolerate his shadowy presence near her
all the time:
'Why don't you go on with your wood-carving?'
she said. 'Why don't you finish your Adam and Eve?'
But she did not care for the Adam and Eve and
he never put another stroke to it. She jeered at
the Eve saying 'She is like a little marionette.
Why is she so small? You've made Adam as big as
God, and Eve like a doll.
'It's impudence to say that Woman was made out
of Man's body,' she continued, 'when every man is
born of woman. What impudence, what arroaance!1
(p.174).
Anna's questioning reveals her self-sufficiency.
Her distaste
for the notion that man is an intermediary between women and God
is shown when she dances naked and pregnant in front of Will.
Later this scene will be closely analysed.
Another important detail in Will's carving of Adam and Eve
is the angels with covered faces.
The fact that angels normally
represent purity and in the carving they have their faces covered
may imply Will's latent fear of women.
This may be the reason