RELATIONS OF DOMINANCE AND EQUALITY IN D. H. LAWRENCE

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for Tom and Lydia in The Rainbow who attain a certain balance,
but even this achievement, we see, is not permanent,. since Tom
dies early in the novel implying that the other couples must
continue the search.
Other novels show the struggle between the
couples but no one can really say that they get 'there1. The
couples would rather fight for dominance in the relation.
This
idea, I believe, proves that the author's feelings are different
from his didactic intentions.
Another of Lawrence's 'intentions' refers to his idea that
man and woman form 'the ideal pair'. In "Morality and the Novel"
he claims that
The great relationship, for humanity, will
always be the relation between man and woman.
The relation:-between man and man, woman and
woman, parent and child, will always be
subsidiary.
And the relation between man and woman will
change for ever, and will for ever be the new
central clue to human life. It is the relation
itself which is the quick and the central clue
to life, not man, nor the woman, nor the
children that result from the relationship, as
a contingency (Beal, p.113).
How can it be that some of his novels try to put the relation
between man and man in first plan and man and woman become
secondary? One may just take a look at Women in Love
which
starts to present the man-to-man relationship as additional to
marriage; or at The Plumed Serpent where this relation becomes
the alternative to marriage. In other words, the man-to-woman
relation is no longer important.
Again theory and practice do
not match.
I do not want to claim that Lawrence is right or
wrong: I say that he, like all human beings, is contradictory.
We say we do what we think, but who guarantees the truth of this
statement? "Never trust the artist. Trust the tale"! Lawrence
probably never thought how much his statement could perfectly