Has With The Women In His Life Essay, Research Paper
Sons and Lovers: Examine the Relationships Paul has with the
Women in his Life.
Paul Morel is the main character in DH Lawrence s novel Sons and
Lovers . The story charts his early life from when his parents married and
the subsequent birth of four children, through childhood and early
adulthood to the death of his mother. During this time three women have
a major impact on his life, his mother, Miriam and Clara. Each has the
most influence at different times in his life and can be attributed to his
childhood, being a young man and early adulthood respectively; but each
woman s influence carries on to shape Paul into the man he becomes.
From the very beginning there is a connection between Paul and his
mother in that he looks like her with his dark hair and blue eyes. As a
child he seemed old for his years , grave and serious like Mrs Morel. He
is a quiet boy but spirited much like his mother and this increases with
age as his other s influence becomes more apparent. When she fretted he
understood, and could have no peace. His soul seemed always attentive to
her is the way their attachment is described; their bond is very strong
and very deep. As Paul grew older she never suffered alone for her
husband s faults and what she lacked in life because her children
suffered with her . It hurt the boy keenly, this feeling about her, that she
had never had her life s fulfilment so much so that it became his
childish aim to provide it. When he began to work it was almost as if it
were her own life . Paul almost hated his mother for this suffering when
his father did not come home from work. He felt she should not waste
herself on a man like his father when she could rely on her son. This
stems from the jealousy Paul feels of his father because of his place in the
household, in his mother s affections and efforts, all of which he
disregards.
Paul never had a strong constitution as he was subject to bouts of
bronchitis. Described as delicate , this accounted for his mother s
difference in feeling for him compared with her other children. She
treated him more tenderly and felt he was of a better mettle than her other
children but physically weaker so she always felt a mixture of anguish in
her love for him . Further to this Paul could never go home empty to his
mother not even when collecting blackberries and because he never did
so she did not expect to be disappointed by him. That he felt he would
disappoint her he would have died rather which is a major reason why
he broke it off with Miriam – his mother did not like her, she felt Miriam
did not make Paul happy, nor would she make a good wife. Paul could do
better. Mrs morel was also jealous of Miriam and felt that if they should
become heavily involved and marry she d leave me no room – not a bit of
room- .
Paul was also jealous of William, his older brother, whom his mother had
a more passionate relationship with. After his death when Mrs Morel
could not pull herself out of her grief and barely spoke to Paul, he became
ill and lost the will to live until she woke from her grief-stricken stupor.
Paul was more of a companion to his mother, particularly after William s
departure to London and his eventual death; Mrs Morel s life now rooted
itself in Paul . She told him all her troubles and he took it in as best he
could as a child and a man.
Although the book depicts Paul as being more himself when he is with
Miriam it is necessary for him to have his mother to soothe him. His
ridiculous hyper-sensitiveness made her heart ache and it made him
miserable so he found relief in the company of his mother. However,
Miriam cultivated this sensitive nature to match her own and to such an
extent that he can t bear to be himself or see himself reflected in Miriam.
He begins to hate Miriam because she does this to him, she makes him
what he doesn t want to be, and because she is not like his mother. This
relationship he has with his mother is also slightly ambiguous with
incestuous overtones to it. For example the interview at Jordan s in
Nottingham which Mrs Morel attends with the young Paul allows them
time to amble around the city feeling the excitement of lovers having an
adventure together . His heart often contracts with pain of love for her .
Miriam is Paul s first love, the daughter of a local family who live on a
farm about eight miles away. A comparison can be drawn with Miriam
very early on in the book when Paul breaks his sister s doll and then
sacrifices it. This act disturbed Annie inwardly, although she could say
nothing. He seemed to hate the doll so intensely because he had broken
it. This can be seen as a metaphor for the following relationship with
Miriam: he hates her because he thinks he has broken her heart and her
spirit when in fact, as he finds out later, he really hasn t done either. Paul
appears different to other men for Miriam, he is finer, more artistic and
sensitive than most other men, particularly her father and brothers. Paul
is all that Miriam would like to be when he is described as quick, light,
graceful, who could be gentle and who could be sad, and who was clever,
and who knew a lot and who had a death in the family ; he is mysterious
and learned.
Miriam is very subservient and reverent to Paul as shown when she make
the swing comfortable for him and that gave her pleasure . This attitude
towards him irritated Paul so much that he stormed at her, got
ashamed…and grew furious again, abusing her , this was the course of
their relationship. Miriam puts her soul into everything from algebra to
loving her younger brother. Sometimes he hated her as he did both
Clara and his mother at times because her intensity, which would leave
no emotion on a normal plane, irritated the youth into a frenzy . At times
like these he was thankful for his mother and her reserve. It is also
apparent that Miriam understands Paul and vice versa. Often she doesn t
understand why she feels a certain way, particularly about bis paintings,
so he explains it to her because he knows why. Similarly, she managed
to find some meaning in his struggling, abstract speeches which
sometimes, as shown by his fluctuating feelings towards Miriam, he does
not always understand or speak completely truthfully. Relating to this is
Miriam s belief that Paul makes things real for her, till he had seen it she
felt it had not come into her soul. Only he could make it her own,
immortal. This appears like an almost complete reliance at first yet we
realise when Miriam ends it that Paul always clung to her like a four
year-old child rather than she clinging to Paul.
As for intimacy between the two of them, it went on in an utterly
blanched and chaste fashion although Miriam did eventually give herself
to Paul physically but her soul stood apart . She loves him again when
he is gentle and talks of trees but separates herself from the act. She can
never give herself to him totally, as his mother and Clara could not either,
so he eventually leaves her. He does say that he would give anything to
want to marry her, make love to her, be gentle with her and share her
reverie and religious dreams but he can t. Eventually it becomes a duty to
see Miriam. He returns to her one Spring after avoiding her all Winter
because he feels he should. He loved Miriam with his soul…If ever he
should marry…it would be his duty to marry Miriam. Miriam eventually
is a chore and when the dance becomes too old Paul leaves her, just as
she expected him to.
Clara is the other major female figure in Paul s life. She is the estranged
wife of Paul s colleague Baxter Dawes and somewhat older than Paul.
The relationship with Clara is very much a physical one and could
perhaps be contrasted to the relationship with Miriam in a physical versus
spiritual context. His mother s influence can again be seen in this
relationship when early in the book Mrs Morel s arms are described as
very handsome, strong arms , a feature which he finds attractive in Clara.
He is fascinated by their dull gleam . As with all the women in Paul s life
there was something in Clara Paul disliked . He feels physically stifled
by her as he was inwardly stifled by Miriam; he can t paint near her
because he feels he must talk to her. She criticises his work so he thinks
she doesn t understand it and is disappointed in her. Like Miriam, he
then abused her but she was amused . This again irritates him because
she stinks with silent pride . Despite this dislike of her in some ways he
lusts after her and aches to see her. Sunday comes between his visits and
it goes slowly, hour after laborious hour. He is physically enamoured of
her, for example her ear, half hidden among her blonde hair, was near to
him. The temptation to kiss it was almost too great. This leads to the fact
that for Paul sex is the culmination of intimacy, but as for Miriam, it is
not with Clara either. This proves Paul s relationship with Clara is purely
physical, as shown by the descriptions of her such as He could see her
figure inside the dress, as if that were wrapped closely round her.
In all the relationships are very different between Clara and Miriam but if
you added the aspects of them together they create something of the
relationship Paul had with his mother but in a more sexual context. In all
of them Paul is content, yet discontent, happy yet sad, calm but angry -
he is a mass of contradictions and seems to realise this at the end of the
book when he not only symbolically walks away from the mistakes and
people of the past but his past self also. It is obvious his mother had a
great effect on Paul not only in his actions but in the development of his
personality and will probably continue to after her death.
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