T H E S I S

16
that Lawrence was initiated into love-making by a married woman.
He says that William Hopkin heard his wife talking to a married
woman of Eastwood who said:
"Sallie, I gave Bert sex. I had to. He was over at our
house, struggling with a poem he couldn't finish, so I
took him upstairs and gave him sex. He came downstairs
and finished the poem. 11 (TIH 131)
H»' Aldington observes, furthermore:
“Whatever else may be denied Lawrence there can be no doubt
that he had a great attraction for many women, all the more
so since his innate puritanism kept them at a distance. 11
(PGB 106)
Thus, biographically we can find enough material relevant
to Lawrence’s character-formation and identification with his puritan
mother. From The White Peacock to Lady Chatterley's Lover
both by content and form Lawrence displays, even if unconsciously,
the puritanical factors which were transferred to him by his
mother and they are embodied especially in his autobiographical
novel Sons and Lovers? written in 1910 and published in 1912»
The conflict in this Freudian novel (even though Lawrence
did not intend it to be Freudian, since he did not know Freud's
theories yet) is Paul Morel's (Lawrence's) relationship with his
mother. Mrs« Morel centres all her expectations on her son, but
as he grows older, tensions develop in this relationship and his
frustrated passions for two other women, especially Miriam (his
first girl-friend Jessie) trap him in a nearly fatal conflict of
sexual love and maternal possessiveness.1
1
This theme has raised the question of the Oedipus complex
in Lawrence himself. Many critics have studied this novel from
a Freudian point of view. Graham Hough says that "the situation