RELATIONS OF DOMINANCE AND EQUALITY IN D. H. LAWRENCE

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shadow of her corner, she need not any more be
divided in herself trying to keep up two planes
of consciousness. She could at last lapse into
the odour of the fox.
For the youth... sent a faint but distinct
odour in the room, undefinable, but something
like a wild creature. March no longer tried to
reserve herself from it. She was still and soft
in her corner like a passive creature in its
ca:ve (p.98 - My underlining).
The passage presents them as two animals (a wilder, dominant
one, and a passive one).
There is also a reference to March's
divided self: her masculine side which has up to now been fed by
her friend Banford; the other, her female side, is being
awakened by this fox-like boy.
Through the last sentence of the
passage there is a clear statement that March is accepting
passively the change.
It is as if it were her fate to change.
Henry is allowed to stop at Bailey Farm till he finds a
place to live.
Here starts the war between March and her
divided self: Banford (her male side)and Henry (her female side).
The very night Henry stops at the farm March has her first dream,
a signalling of her involvement with this boy.
In the dream the
point is that the fox/Henry is calling her femaleness to come to
awareness.
Her sexual impulses towards man are awakening from
the river of her unconsciousness.
When in the dream, the fox
bites her wrist and whisks his brush across her face, she feels
as if in flames.
The passage implies that March wants vividly
to be touched by a man.
Or it may imply that March's 'submission'
is masochistic; or even that Lawrence sees the male as
intrinsically sadistic; the female is in some sense his victim.
The fact that March feels as if burned and in pain may imply the
conflict of having not yet decided her life (sexually) or that
this decision will cost her too much.
Henry seems to be lazy.
While the girls do their work the