Lawrence among the Women

Instead of following in the footsteps of his patriarchal precursors, this approach to Lawrence challenges the standard representation of Lawrence in feminist criticism and places his work in the context of women's literary traditions. Rather than epitomizing the patriarchal tradition, she finds his work characterized by the ambiguity of his struggle to speak for women but against socially constructed femininity. Lawrence created female characters who are naturally enraged by their subordinate situation and rebel aagainst male authority. Their eloquent voices often undercut Lawrence's misognynistic doctrinal pronouncements. The book places Lawrence's novels in a tradition proceeding from such Victorian women novelists as Emily and Charlotte Bronte and George Eliot, and traces this tradition through successors including Doris Lessing, Charistina Stead, Elizabeth Bowen and Eudora Welty. It evaluates the direct influence on Lawrence's artistic decisions, of the women in his circle, and returns to and examines the reactions of prominent female modernists such as Virginia Woolf, Katherine Mansfield, H.D. and Anais Nin to his conception of women's literary traditions. Siegel's perspective on Lawrence as a male writer struggling to participate in what he perceived to be women's literary traditions brings into focus issues that challenge current theories on and practices of gendering literary traditions.