Lady Chatterley's Lover

D. H. Lawrence

Fiction | Novel | Adult | Published in 1928

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Summary

Background

Chapter Summaries & Analyses

Chapters 1-4

Chapters 5-9

Chapters 10-12

Chapters 13-16

Chapters 17-19

Character Analysis

Themes

Symbols & Motifs

Important Quotes

Essay Topics

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Discussion Questions

Symbols & Motifs

Clifford’s Wheelchair

After Clifford is severely injured in World War I, he is paralyzed from the waist down and uses a wheelchair to move around. The wheelchair symbolizes how the modern world is growing increasingly reliant on technology and machinery; it also symbolizes how the upper classes, who traditionally held the most power, are becoming increasingly fragile and powerless.

The narrative and various characters repeatedly comment on how the modern world is decaying because humanity has become dependent on machinery, cut off from the rhythms of the natural world. Industrialization and technological progress left human beings increasingly alienated; in the aftermath of the war, people had also witnessed how technology, such as machine guns and poison gas, could be harnessed to cause atrocities. Clifford’s wheelchair is a machine that reflects the suffering that machines can cause, and the cyclical nature of technology; because he was hurt by machines during war time, he is now dependent on machines.

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Since Clifford is an aristocrat, his use of a wheelchair reflects the decline of the upper classes. In a key scene, Clifford is forced to rely on Mellors, a working-class man, to push the chair up a hill. The scene symbolically reveals how the upper classes only achieve power and wealth because of the physical labor of the working classes. Clifford is vulnerable and powerless, unable to do anything for himself, which reveals the parasitic nature of the social elite. While wheelchairs are an empowering adaptive technology that offer benefits for many individuals, Lawrence mostly portrays the wheelchair as a negative symbol in his novel.

The Pheasant Chicks

When Connie begins to spend a lot of time in the woods with Mellors, she often goes to the hut where he keeps pheasant hens and their chicks. Connie is handling the chicks the first time that Mellors invites her to come to his cottage and have sex. The pheasant chicks symbolize vulnerability and fertility. The chicks are tiny babies, and their vulnerability touches Connie’s heart, filling her with a longing to eventually nurture a child.

On the day that she and Mellors first have sex, Connie begins weeping while holding the chicks, and the sight of her tears moves him to try and comfort her. The fragility and defenselessness of the chicks symbolizes how Connie becomes utterly vulnerable with Mellors, first when she weeps, and then when she has sex and shares her most intimate self with him. The association of the chicks with infants and new life symbolizes how the relationship between Connie and Mellors is going to be literally and metaphorically fertile: They quickly conceive a child together, but also generate a new sense of optimism and hope for the future.

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The chicks also symbolize a vision of femininity that can only be satisfied when it experiences sexuality and fertility: Connie weeps while holding the chicks because she thinks she will never be able to experience the pleasure of having sex with a man and becoming a mother.

Nakedness

Nakedness is an important motif in the novel, reflecting themes of characters achieving self-actualization when they abandon artificial social norms and embrace their instinctual and authentic selves. Connie begins her journey of self-awakening when she happens upon Mellors bathing outside of his cottage and sees his naked body. Although she does not register sexual attraction right away, Connie is moved by the vulnerability of seeing his body. Significantly, the nakedness coincides with a rural setting and an outdoor space: Mellors is at his most human in his naked state, living in the natural world like any other animal.

The convergence of nakedness and the outdoors coincide repeatedly, since Connie and Mellors sometimes make love outside, reveling in being able to be completely free. Later in their relationship, Connie goes outside and dances naked in the rain, revealing her newfound sense of freedom, spontaneity, and joy. When characters are naked, they are always portrayed as free and joyous, in contrast with a social world where clothes represent expectations and norms that are imposed.

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Nakedness also features in the text because of the representation of sexual encounters between Connie and Mellors. Especially as their relationship progresses and they become more comfortable with one another, they revel in exploring each other’s naked bodies. They spend time looking at each other and touching each other, noticing details such as their body hair. Nothing is shameful or ugly to them, because they see each other’s bodies as pure and as a source of joy and pleasure. Their ability to love each other’s naked bodies reveals the increasing emotional intimacy between the two characters.