RELATIONS OF DOMINANCE AND EQUALITY IN D. H. LAWRENCE

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as alternatives to the relation between man and woman.
And
although these two alternatives have apparently failed, Lawrence
does not leave the subject.
The 'female bonding' is perhaps
less important than the friendship between men because it is the
latter which recurs in another stories.
The fact that Gerald
has rejected
Birkin makes it clear that it is not yet the
moment for Lawrence to put his finger on the scale to favor a
relation between men.
However, Women in Love shows that the
bloodbrotherhood theme is becoming central in Lawrence's
fiction.
And although it does not succeed in this novel, it
comes to dominate in the leadership novels represented by
Aaron's Rod, Kangaroo and The Plumed Serpent.
The four scenes analysed here reflect a series of
consecutive defeats in Birkin's attempt to have either Ursula or
Gerald. The last defeat leads Birkin to return to Ursula. The
chapter "Excurse" may be called the exposition of Birkin's sins,
his redemption and subsequent meeting with Ursula to assert their
definitive rejection of the old world and their intention to
build a new one.
Birkin, in a car, takes Ursula from her school and they
drive for some time to a place where they can be alone. . When
they stop he gives her a gift.
The importance of this gift lies
in the fact that Birkin wants to start a new relation with
Ursula but he gives her some second-hand rings.
It is as if he
did not care very much for his own intention to build a new
world with Ursula.
It seems that these rings are a bad omen for
the couple: mainly because they are second-hand and because the •
first owner has given them away.
In giving the rings to Ursula,
Birkin is not offering a new alternative to her but offering her
an old and already used alternative.
The rings may also be seen