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The Fox
Sharply observed and expertly crafted, D.H. Lawrence’s The Fox is a captivating work exploring the dual themes of power and supremacy in the aftermath of the First World War. Banford and March live and work together on their meager farm, surviving hardship only by sheer determination and dedicated labor. The farm is their world, a place of safety—that is, until a young soldier walks in and upsets the women’s delicate status quo. None could have predicted the effect his presence would have on their lives.
84 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 1923
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About the author
D.H. Lawrence
2,084 books4,197 followersDavid Herbert Richards Lawrence was an English writer of the 20th century, whose prolific and diverse output included novels, short stories, poems, plays, essays, travel books, paintings, translations, literary criticism, and personal letters. His collected works represent an extended reflection upon the dehumanizing effects of modernity and industrialisation. In them, Lawrence confronts issues relating to emotional health and vitality, spontaneity, human sexuality and instinct.
Lawrence's opinions earned him many enemies and he endured official persecution, censorship, and misrepresentation of his creative work throughout the second half of his life, much of which he spent in a voluntary exile he called his "savage pilgrimage." At the time of his death, his public reputation was that of a pornographer who had wasted his considerable talents. E. M. Forster, in an obituary notice, challenged this widely held view, describing him as "the greatest imaginative novelist of our generation." Later, the influential Cambridge critic F. R. Leavis championed both his artistic integrity and his moral seriousness, placing much of Lawrence's fiction within the canonical "great tradition" of the English novel. He is now generally valued as a visionary thinker and a significant representative of modernism in English literature.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/D.H._Law...
Lawrence's opinions earned him many enemies and he endured official persecution, censorship, and misrepresentation of his creative work throughout the second half of his life, much of which he spent in a voluntary exile he called his "savage pilgrimage." At the time of his death, his public reputation was that of a pornographer who had wasted his considerable talents. E. M. Forster, in an obituary notice, challenged this widely held view, describing him as "the greatest imaginative novelist of our generation." Later, the influential Cambridge critic F. R. Leavis championed both his artistic integrity and his moral seriousness, placing much of Lawrence's fiction within the canonical "great tradition" of the English novel. He is now generally valued as a visionary thinker and a significant representative of modernism in English literature.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/D.H._Law...
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 375 reviews
April 7, 2024
Lawrence in uber-gloom mood
Gosh, this was depressing, though not at first. It’s typical Lawrence in some ways:
• Mankind, and men especially, as animals, subject to forces of nature, and thus absolved of guilt (or at least, feeling guilty).
“The inner necessity of his life was fulfilling itself.”
• Men “mastering” and having rights to women (not that Lawrence approves).
• Awareness of transgressions of class boundaries.
• Relationships with awful foundations.
• The hopeless helplessness of being a married woman in 1918.
• The significance of blue.
But unlike many other Lawrences, there was no joyful passion; no joy or passion of any kind really. There are a few fiery analogies, but barely any earthy or floral ones.
Fox
Image: Fox stalking in countryside (Source.)
So many associations: sly, beautiful, cunning, ruthless, sexy (foxy woman, silver fox (alluring older man), fur stole), vermin, scavenger, hunter, hunted… The two foxes in this story are most of those things.
The setup
Towards the end of the Great War, with villagers suffering from the flu pandemic of 1918, Nellie March (“the man about the place”) and frail Jill Banford struggle to survive on a small farm, but they’re independent, and in charge of their destinies.
They’re under 30, and Lawrence suggests they’re a couple as strongly as he could at the time, with “odd whims and unsatisfied tendencies”. March tries to hunt the fox that’s taking their hens, but when she finally encounters it, is oddly fixated by it:
“He looked into her eyes and her soul failed her… He knew her.”
When Henry (aka “the boy”), the eighteen-year old grandson of the previous owner turns up, he and the fox are immediately conflated in March’s mind, and her reaction is similar. She is bizarrely “spellbound”. There is now a triangle, and the plot seems obvious (though implausible), but it takes an unexpected turn.
The last few pages are shocking and bleak.
“There was a moment of pure, motionless suspense, when the world seemed to stand still.”
Eyes
This story is told through the eyes.
Image: Fox eyes (Source.)
• “Her eyes were keen and observant.”
• “Her great startled eyes glowing.”
• “His eyes were wild and childish.”
• “Wide-eyed and silent.”
• “Watching her without moving his eyes.”
• Blue eyes, once “clouded” become “strangely clear”.
• “Her dark, startled, vulnerable eyes.”
• “Her eyes were wide and absent.”
• “His eyes round and very clear and intent.”
• “Staring with hot, blue eyes from his scarlet face.”
• “His face and his eyes on fire.”
• “Her eyes went black and vacant.”
• “No emotion on his face. Only his eyes tightened and became fixed and intent.”
• “Her queer, round-pupilled, weak eyes.”
• “He watched with intense bright eyes, as he would watch a wild goose he had shot.”
Happiness is unattainable
Lawrence has a horribly depressing slant on “the whole history of the search for happiness, whether it be your own or somebody else’s that you want to win”:
“The more you reached after the fatal flower of happiness, which trembles so blue and lovely in a crevice just beyond your grasp, the more fearfully you become aware of the ghastly and awful gulf of the precipice below you… You pluck flower after flower - it is never the flower. The flower itself… is the bottomless pit… [The search] ends, and it always ends, in the ghastly sense of the bottomless nothingness into which you will inevitably fall if you strain any farther.”
Image: Alpine bellflowers (Source.)
Although Lawrence’s men often feel entitled to take and dominate women, he is sympathetic to women's plight:
“And women? - what goal can any woman conceive, except happiness?”
[This is immediately after he’s argued its unattainability.]
“She assumes the responsibility and sets off towards her goal… at the foot of the rainbow… But at the end of the rainbow is a bottomless gulf down which you can fall forever without arriving, and the blue distance is a void pit which can swallow you and all your efforts into its emptiness, and still be no emptier.”
Quotes
• “The trees on the wood-edge were a darkish, brownish green in the full light… Beyond, the naked, copper-like shafts and limbs of the pine trees shone in the air. Nearer the rough grass, with its long, brownish stalks all agleam, was full of light.”
• “White and soft as snow his belly… She passed her hand softly down it. And his wonderful black-glinted brush was full and frictional, wonderful. She passed her hand down this also, and quivered… Then she took the head into her hand.” (Henry had succeeded in killing the fox.)
• “It was late in the damp December afternoon, with cold mists creeping out of the woods and up the hollows, and darkness waiting to sink in from above.” (Lawrence isn’t subtle in his analogies!)
• “She had to be passive… to be submerged under the surface of love”, like seaweed.
More Lawrence
• See my reviews of other Lawrence short stories, including common themes, HERE.
• By far my favourite Lawrence is his novel, The Rainbow, which I reviewed HERE.
Other mystical foxes
• See David Garnett (of the Bloomsbury Group)'s novella, Lady into Fox, which I reviewed HERE.
• Daisy Johnson's Fen is a collection of mythic, mystical short stories, focused on young women, and set in the Fens of contemporary England. One of the stories there has echoes of this. See my review HERE.
Gosh, this was depressing, though not at first. It’s typical Lawrence in some ways:
• Mankind, and men especially, as animals, subject to forces of nature, and thus absolved of guilt (or at least, feeling guilty).
“The inner necessity of his life was fulfilling itself.”
• Men “mastering” and having rights to women (not that Lawrence approves).
• Awareness of transgressions of class boundaries.
• Relationships with awful foundations.
• The hopeless helplessness of being a married woman in 1918.
• The significance of blue.
But unlike many other Lawrences, there was no joyful passion; no joy or passion of any kind really. There are a few fiery analogies, but barely any earthy or floral ones.
Fox
Image: Fox stalking in countryside (Source.)
So many associations: sly, beautiful, cunning, ruthless, sexy (foxy woman, silver fox (alluring older man), fur stole), vermin, scavenger, hunter, hunted… The two foxes in this story are most of those things.
The setup
Towards the end of the Great War, with villagers suffering from the flu pandemic of 1918, Nellie March (“the man about the place”) and frail Jill Banford struggle to survive on a small farm, but they’re independent, and in charge of their destinies.
They’re under 30, and Lawrence suggests they’re a couple as strongly as he could at the time, with “odd whims and unsatisfied tendencies”. March tries to hunt the fox that’s taking their hens, but when she finally encounters it, is oddly fixated by it:
“He looked into her eyes and her soul failed her… He knew her.”
When Henry (aka “the boy”), the eighteen-year old grandson of the previous owner turns up, he and the fox are immediately conflated in March’s mind, and her reaction is similar. She is bizarrely “spellbound”. There is now a triangle, and the plot seems obvious (though implausible), but it takes an unexpected turn.
The last few pages are shocking and bleak.
“There was a moment of pure, motionless suspense, when the world seemed to stand still.”
Eyes
This story is told through the eyes.
Image: Fox eyes (Source.)
• “Her eyes were keen and observant.”
• “Her great startled eyes glowing.”
• “His eyes were wild and childish.”
• “Wide-eyed and silent.”
• “Watching her without moving his eyes.”
• Blue eyes, once “clouded” become “strangely clear”.
• “Her dark, startled, vulnerable eyes.”
• “Her eyes were wide and absent.”
• “His eyes round and very clear and intent.”
• “Staring with hot, blue eyes from his scarlet face.”
• “His face and his eyes on fire.”
• “Her eyes went black and vacant.”
• “No emotion on his face. Only his eyes tightened and became fixed and intent.”
• “Her queer, round-pupilled, weak eyes.”
• “He watched with intense bright eyes, as he would watch a wild goose he had shot.”
Happiness is unattainable
Lawrence has a horribly depressing slant on “the whole history of the search for happiness, whether it be your own or somebody else’s that you want to win”:
“The more you reached after the fatal flower of happiness, which trembles so blue and lovely in a crevice just beyond your grasp, the more fearfully you become aware of the ghastly and awful gulf of the precipice below you… You pluck flower after flower - it is never the flower. The flower itself… is the bottomless pit… [The search] ends, and it always ends, in the ghastly sense of the bottomless nothingness into which you will inevitably fall if you strain any farther.”
Image: Alpine bellflowers (Source.)
Although Lawrence’s men often feel entitled to take and dominate women, he is sympathetic to women's plight:
“And women? - what goal can any woman conceive, except happiness?”
[This is immediately after he’s argued its unattainability.]
“She assumes the responsibility and sets off towards her goal… at the foot of the rainbow… But at the end of the rainbow is a bottomless gulf down which you can fall forever without arriving, and the blue distance is a void pit which can swallow you and all your efforts into its emptiness, and still be no emptier.”
Quotes
• “The trees on the wood-edge were a darkish, brownish green in the full light… Beyond, the naked, copper-like shafts and limbs of the pine trees shone in the air. Nearer the rough grass, with its long, brownish stalks all agleam, was full of light.”
• “White and soft as snow his belly… She passed her hand softly down it. And his wonderful black-glinted brush was full and frictional, wonderful. She passed her hand down this also, and quivered… Then she took the head into her hand.” (Henry had succeeded in killing the fox.)
• “It was late in the damp December afternoon, with cold mists creeping out of the woods and up the hollows, and darkness waiting to sink in from above.” (Lawrence isn’t subtle in his analogies!)
• “She had to be passive… to be submerged under the surface of love”, like seaweed.
More Lawrence
• See my reviews of other Lawrence short stories, including common themes, HERE.
• By far my favourite Lawrence is his novel, The Rainbow, which I reviewed HERE.
Other mystical foxes
• See David Garnett (of the Bloomsbury Group)'s novella, Lady into Fox, which I reviewed HERE.
• Daisy Johnson's Fen is a collection of mythic, mystical short stories, focused on young women, and set in the Fens of contemporary England. One of the stories there has echoes of this. See my review HERE.
August 26, 2019
This novel brought many new things on the fore that the readers of that time could not calmly digest. However, the newness is still intact to an extent. Lawrence's success depends largely upon his persistence; he is adamant (vehemently) to doing what he wants. The Fox is certainly a game-changer, and it was too.
September 25, 2025
I’d never read anything by D H Lawrence prior to this, and was mildly curious about his work. This story is 71 pages long and available as a free download, so what did I have to lose? Its length probably puts it on the boundary of the novella and the short story, but as there’s no set definition that I’m aware of, I’ll call it a novella.
This is very much a story with a message, and it’s heavy with symbolism. Having made that statement, I will allow that Lawrence makes his point with a good deal more subtlety than many contemporary authors, those who seem to regard fiction as nothing more than a platform for banging their particular drum. For me, the message in this story was about gender relations, and about whether true happiness is attainable.
I don’t know whether the following was just a feature of the edition I read, but there was a strange pattern in which words like EXERT would suddenly appear in all caps. If you read this, be prepared to PONDER the nature of interactions between men and women, and CONSIDER whether these are in our natures or whether they MERELY reflect societal expectations.
Going by this I don’t think Lawrence is an author for me. I must admit though, that after finishing the novella I spent about half-an-hour thinking about its message. A story that produces that outcome can’t really be considered a dud.
This is very much a story with a message, and it’s heavy with symbolism. Having made that statement, I will allow that Lawrence makes his point with a good deal more subtlety than many contemporary authors, those who seem to regard fiction as nothing more than a platform for banging their particular drum. For me, the message in this story was about gender relations, and about whether true happiness is attainable.
I don’t know whether the following was just a feature of the edition I read, but there was a strange pattern in which words like EXERT would suddenly appear in all caps. If you read this, be prepared to PONDER the nature of interactions between men and women, and CONSIDER whether these are in our natures or whether they MERELY reflect societal expectations.
Going by this I don’t think Lawrence is an author for me. I must admit though, that after finishing the novella I spent about half-an-hour thinking about its message. A story that produces that outcome can’t really be considered a dud.
January 19, 2024
داستان روباه در انگلستان پس از جنگ جهانی اول اتفاق میافتد. دو زن به نام«مارچ»و «بنفورد»که دوستانی صمیمی هستند مزرعهای را میخرند و با هم آن را اداره میکنند تا اینکه سرباز جوانی به نام«هنری»پا به مزرعه میگذارد و زندگی آرام آنها دچار تغییر میشود...
روباه استعارهای از شخصیت هنری است که با فریب و نقشه وارد زندگی این دو زن میشود. در این داستان هم لارنس به تغییر نقش زنان در جنگ و درک آنها از آزادی و ظرفیت پذیرش آن از سوی مردان پرداخته. از یک طرف زنانی که میخواهند مستقل باشند و روی پای خود بایستند و از سوی دیگر مردانی که توقع دارند زنان تحت سلطه آنها باشند و تنشی که میان آنها شکل میگیرد.
اولین کتابی که از لارنس میخوندم و باید بگم فوقالعاده عالی بوده. قلم و شیوه روایتش خیلی برام تازه و جذاب بود.
بزودی باکره و کولی رو هم میخونم.
روباه استعارهای از شخصیت هنری است که با فریب و نقشه وارد زندگی این دو زن میشود. در این داستان هم لارنس به تغییر نقش زنان در جنگ و درک آنها از آزادی و ظرفیت پذیرش آن از سوی مردان پرداخته. از یک طرف زنانی که میخواهند مستقل باشند و روی پای خود بایستند و از سوی دیگر مردانی که توقع دارند زنان تحت سلطه آنها باشند و تنشی که میان آنها شکل میگیرد.
اولین کتابی که از لارنس میخوندم و باید بگم فوقالعاده عالی بوده. قلم و شیوه روایتش خیلی برام تازه و جذاب بود.
بزودی باکره و کولی رو هم میخونم.
August 2, 2025
He Pursued Her...
As a Hunter After Game
THE FOX
by D.H. Lawrence
5 stars. 1918, England. Two women were known to their village by their last names, Banford and March...
Banford's father bought the old Bailey farm for his daughter when he saw that she was sickly, frail, and probably wouldn't marry...
The women saw Bailey farm as their own private property where they answered to each other, and no one else...
But things didn't work out well...
Both women were in their 30s. Jill Banford was the tiny and more fragile of the two, while Ellen (Nellie) March was the more robust and manly...
March wore men's clothing and wanted to be an independent woman with a man's responsibilities...
It was decided early on that Banford would be the woman of the house, and March would do the outdoor chores...
One such chore was hunting down a fox that had been killing their chickens...
One snowy evening...
As the women sat reading in their parlor, a young military man, Henry Grenfel, appeared on their doorstep...
His manner cast a relaxing spell over them. His eyes caused March to identify him with the fox she had been hunting...
The hour was late...
The women invited Grenfel to stay over a few days in their spare bedroom...
It pleased Banford to attend to him, making up the other room for him and drawing his bath. It was like a brother visiting...
Next day...
Both village inns were full, and Grenfel had nowhere to go, so it was agreed that he would stay at the farm for a while...
After a couple of days...
Grenfel looked over the farm and thought he might like to have it for himself...
Shrewdly, he plotted...
Why not marry March, who was much older than himself. He did not so much see her as a woman, but as game he was hunting...
He reasoned...
It is your own will which carries the bullet into the heart of your quarry. The bullet's path is only a projection of your own fate into the fate of the quarry...
Then Grenfel decided...
He would pursue March, not as a man looking for a wife, but as a hunter hunts down game...
He wanted to take away her consciousness and make her just his woman...
This story was an excellent study in the relationships between women, and men and women. Lesbianism is hinted at but not expressly spelled out (the women shared the same bedroom in their two bedroom farmhouse).
The movie, The Fox, starring Sandy Dennis, Anne Heywood, and Keir Dullea was excellent and pretty much stayed true to the book.
As a Hunter After Game
THE FOX
by D.H. Lawrence
5 stars. 1918, England. Two women were known to their village by their last names, Banford and March...
Banford's father bought the old Bailey farm for his daughter when he saw that she was sickly, frail, and probably wouldn't marry...
The women saw Bailey farm as their own private property where they answered to each other, and no one else...
But things didn't work out well...
Both women were in their 30s. Jill Banford was the tiny and more fragile of the two, while Ellen (Nellie) March was the more robust and manly...
March wore men's clothing and wanted to be an independent woman with a man's responsibilities...
It was decided early on that Banford would be the woman of the house, and March would do the outdoor chores...
One such chore was hunting down a fox that had been killing their chickens...
One snowy evening...
As the women sat reading in their parlor, a young military man, Henry Grenfel, appeared on their doorstep...
His manner cast a relaxing spell over them. His eyes caused March to identify him with the fox she had been hunting...
The hour was late...
The women invited Grenfel to stay over a few days in their spare bedroom...
It pleased Banford to attend to him, making up the other room for him and drawing his bath. It was like a brother visiting...
Next day...
Both village inns were full, and Grenfel had nowhere to go, so it was agreed that he would stay at the farm for a while...
After a couple of days...
Grenfel looked over the farm and thought he might like to have it for himself...
Shrewdly, he plotted...
Why not marry March, who was much older than himself. He did not so much see her as a woman, but as game he was hunting...
He reasoned...
It is your own will which carries the bullet into the heart of your quarry. The bullet's path is only a projection of your own fate into the fate of the quarry...
Then Grenfel decided...
He would pursue March, not as a man looking for a wife, but as a hunter hunts down game...
He wanted to take away her consciousness and make her just his woman...
This story was an excellent study in the relationships between women, and men and women. Lesbianism is hinted at but not expressly spelled out (the women shared the same bedroom in their two bedroom farmhouse).
The movie, The Fox, starring Sandy Dennis, Anne Heywood, and Keir Dullea was excellent and pretty much stayed true to the book.
January 19, 2024
کاملا معمولی. وقتی ��ستمش هیچ حسی نداشتم. یه سری توصیف که حسی در من ایجاد نکرد.
August 1, 2025
A 1923 novella or long short story by DH Lawrence, much taken up with what the war represents for humankind, especially with respect to gender relations. Men mostly are killers in wars, they start and finish them. I won't say too much, but read it, if you like, then read Cecily's thorough review. My four stars for the book (audiobook, in this case) isn't meant to reflect on the craftsmanship of the book, which was accomplished by one of the greats of literature. I love his major novels. I just thought this was bleaker and more heavily symbolic than many of his other works. I had just re-read "The Rocking Horse Winner" and "The Virgin and the Gypsy," both of which I "liked" better (though at the moment I might argue The Fox, better known than the Virgin and the Gypsy, is a better novel just in terms of the quality of the prose).
It's the time of WWI. Two young and strong women, Banford and March, have for three years worked a farm, and have a good, contented life until a fox seems to be threatening their livelihood. Then a boy, only known as a boy throughout, comes home from the war to what was once his grandfather's house, to find that he is dead and these two women own the place. They invite him to stay, and things look okay until he fixes his gaze on March--he's a second fox threatening their idyllic back-to-nature existence. March even mistakes him as the fox at one point.
Is it love? Nah. It's power, it's a man intent on "mastering" a woman, and her caving to his desire and control. He wants her and will have her. Thus begins the power struggle of love and mostly hate between Banford and the boy--initially liked by her as a kind of younger brother figure. This is a critique of men, power, violence, more pessimistic than most of Lawrence's work, but the more I write about it, the more I like it as a critique of what we are now calling toxic masculinity. I may wish the women would be as strong and admirable as many of Lawrence's women, but they are just not. They are types, as he is, victims of patriarchy, the darker side of human nature.
It's the time of WWI. Two young and strong women, Banford and March, have for three years worked a farm, and have a good, contented life until a fox seems to be threatening their livelihood. Then a boy, only known as a boy throughout, comes home from the war to what was once his grandfather's house, to find that he is dead and these two women own the place. They invite him to stay, and things look okay until he fixes his gaze on March--he's a second fox threatening their idyllic back-to-nature existence. March even mistakes him as the fox at one point.
Is it love? Nah. It's power, it's a man intent on "mastering" a woman, and her caving to his desire and control. He wants her and will have her. Thus begins the power struggle of love and mostly hate between Banford and the boy--initially liked by her as a kind of younger brother figure. This is a critique of men, power, violence, more pessimistic than most of Lawrence's work, but the more I write about it, the more I like it as a critique of what we are now calling toxic masculinity. I may wish the women would be as strong and admirable as many of Lawrence's women, but they are just not. They are types, as he is, victims of patriarchy, the darker side of human nature.
May 1, 2010
I like and hate D.H. Lawrence.
On the one hand there is something enjoyable about his books, I don't quite know what that something is though. I'm trying to figure it out, but it's just not coming. Somewhere in most of his books that I've read there is something that I like (not love) about them. Not enough that I should have read six of them though. In the case of this book though, I only bought it because I've had luke-warm experiences with Lawrence, but I am a sucker for foxes. The cover is really cute / beautiful.
I don't know too much about D.H. Lawrence as a person. There is a little bio in this book, but I didn't read it. I did notice skimming through it that he was penpals with Bertrand Russell at one point, and later Russell said something like Lawrence's beliefs lead straight to Auschwitz. Something I was happy read, since I couldn't shake the feeling that there were similarities between Lawrence, and some of what I was reading about the Nazi's in The Rise of the Third Reich.
Why D.H. Lawrence is considered a classic I'm not quite sure. He's ok. But he's also bat-shit crazy in some quasi-pagan/mystical blood and soil way that is just embarrassing. The back of this book praises his psychological insight, but his psychology, as a more erudite review than mine on this website talks about, is (my words) utter new age bullshit. I'm talking like The Secret sort of idiocy.
The story is about two women who live together on a farm. One is womanly and frail, the other manly and strong. They aren't doing so well on the farm, because a) they are women who couldn't be bothered to really work the soil properly b) want to have fun. This fun is never illuminated since they never seem to leave their farm. Because they are silly women, with one being more manly and thus better than the other, their farm is failing. Even their chickens don't want to lay eggs, and besides that there is a fox who is feeding off of the chickens. The fox is getting in the way of their fun too, because instead of having fun one of them has to keep standing guard with a gun to try to stop the fox.
Then comes a dude about ten years younger than them. He is a fat-faced soft-spoken layabout just out of the army. Being a man he throws the whole henparty into a tizzy, that is until he decides he wants to own the farm and to do so is going to marry the manly lady.
D.H. Lawrence may understand love, but if he does than I have no conception of relationships between men and women. From earlier Lawrence books I've read I'm fairly certain he is gay. Which is fine. But he isn't just gay, he has some really fucked up power-things going on in his head. The Fox does nothing to disprove this theory. Once the manly woman puts on a dress (she normally dresses in manly work clothes), the shifty layabout no longer wishes to possess her as passionately, he still wants to marry her because that is what he has made up his mind to do, but he doesn't desire to make love to her. He's basically turned off by her, and only wants he to push his will on to.
The manly woman irrationally finds this character attractive at times. For example when he's sweaty and red-faced and gasping for breath after a long bicycle ride:
She is normally described as bright looking, or at least when the lay-about isn't around. This is sort of like proto-Nazi theorist Otto Weininger ideas of women psychology.
In Lawrence's defense he does paint this dude as a total schmuck, and he's obviously not the proto-he-man that other Lawrence books put on a pedestal, but there is still something repulsive about the way he writes interactions between the sexes. Even a turd of a man can make a strong independent woman bend to his will and get all gooey when he is around.
I'm not sure what exactly I did like about the book to off-set all of this. Maybe it is just the very cute picture of a fox on the cover. The cover gets five stars from me!
On the one hand there is something enjoyable about his books, I don't quite know what that something is though. I'm trying to figure it out, but it's just not coming. Somewhere in most of his books that I've read there is something that I like (not love) about them. Not enough that I should have read six of them though. In the case of this book though, I only bought it because I've had luke-warm experiences with Lawrence, but I am a sucker for foxes. The cover is really cute / beautiful.
I don't know too much about D.H. Lawrence as a person. There is a little bio in this book, but I didn't read it. I did notice skimming through it that he was penpals with Bertrand Russell at one point, and later Russell said something like Lawrence's beliefs lead straight to Auschwitz. Something I was happy read, since I couldn't shake the feeling that there were similarities between Lawrence, and some of what I was reading about the Nazi's in The Rise of the Third Reich.
Why D.H. Lawrence is considered a classic I'm not quite sure. He's ok. But he's also bat-shit crazy in some quasi-pagan/mystical blood and soil way that is just embarrassing. The back of this book praises his psychological insight, but his psychology, as a more erudite review than mine on this website talks about, is (my words) utter new age bullshit. I'm talking like The Secret sort of idiocy.
The story is about two women who live together on a farm. One is womanly and frail, the other manly and strong. They aren't doing so well on the farm, because a) they are women who couldn't be bothered to really work the soil properly b) want to have fun. This fun is never illuminated since they never seem to leave their farm. Because they are silly women, with one being more manly and thus better than the other, their farm is failing. Even their chickens don't want to lay eggs, and besides that there is a fox who is feeding off of the chickens. The fox is getting in the way of their fun too, because instead of having fun one of them has to keep standing guard with a gun to try to stop the fox.
Then comes a dude about ten years younger than them. He is a fat-faced soft-spoken layabout just out of the army. Being a man he throws the whole henparty into a tizzy, that is until he decides he wants to own the farm and to do so is going to marry the manly lady.
D.H. Lawrence may understand love, but if he does than I have no conception of relationships between men and women. From earlier Lawrence books I've read I'm fairly certain he is gay. Which is fine. But he isn't just gay, he has some really fucked up power-things going on in his head. The Fox does nothing to disprove this theory. Once the manly woman puts on a dress (she normally dresses in manly work clothes), the shifty layabout no longer wishes to possess her as passionately, he still wants to marry her because that is what he has made up his mind to do, but he doesn't desire to make love to her. He's basically turned off by her, and only wants he to push his will on to.
The manly woman irrationally finds this character attractive at times. For example when he's sweaty and red-faced and gasping for breath after a long bicycle ride:
She stood aside, slack, with one knee drooped and the axe resting its head loosely on the ground. Her eyes were wide and vacant, and her upper lip lifted from her teeth in that helpless, fascinated rabbit-look. The moment she saw his red glowing face it was all over with her. She was as helpless as if she was bound.
She is normally described as bright looking, or at least when the lay-about isn't around. This is sort of like proto-Nazi theorist Otto Weininger ideas of women psychology.
In Lawrence's defense he does paint this dude as a total schmuck, and he's obviously not the proto-he-man that other Lawrence books put on a pedestal, but there is still something repulsive about the way he writes interactions between the sexes. Even a turd of a man can make a strong independent woman bend to his will and get all gooey when he is around.
I'm not sure what exactly I did like about the book to off-set all of this. Maybe it is just the very cute picture of a fox on the cover. The cover gets five stars from me!
April 30, 2014
Two ladies in a farm. One a little bit attractive, the other not so. The former with imagined ample, soft, round breasts: the latter, with imagined small, hard-as-a-rock tits. "Imagined" because the male protagonist didn't say he saw them. He just imagined them.
The ladies are there by themselves trying to earn a living taking care of their livestocks, mostly chickens. But they are losing chickens because of a fox who raids them when no one is looking. One time, the prettier of the two ladies had a brief, staring episode with the fox. From then on, she could no longer forget about it.
Then a young, virile, ex-soldier came. He was a former resident of that house [with his grandfather who had died after he ran away]. It was the first time the ladies saw him, but they took him in because he had nowhere else to go. He and the more attractive lady had a liking for each other even if at first she had likened him to the fox she could not forget [or, maybe, it was because she considered him like the fox that she had liked him]. He, indeed, pounced on her like a fox would pounce upon a juicy, fresh hen.
When she agreed to marry this man-fox, the uglier of the two showed her disapproval. The man-fox then got angry at her [secretly] and killed her, although he was able to make it appear that she died by accident. He was then able to marry the remaining girl and brought her to Canada.
But like a fox with a chicken he caught and carries with his mouth, neither of them was really happy.
The end.
The ladies are there by themselves trying to earn a living taking care of their livestocks, mostly chickens. But they are losing chickens because of a fox who raids them when no one is looking. One time, the prettier of the two ladies had a brief, staring episode with the fox. From then on, she could no longer forget about it.
Then a young, virile, ex-soldier came. He was a former resident of that house [with his grandfather who had died after he ran away]. It was the first time the ladies saw him, but they took him in because he had nowhere else to go. He and the more attractive lady had a liking for each other even if at first she had likened him to the fox she could not forget [or, maybe, it was because she considered him like the fox that she had liked him]. He, indeed, pounced on her like a fox would pounce upon a juicy, fresh hen.
When she agreed to marry this man-fox, the uglier of the two showed her disapproval. The man-fox then got angry at her [secretly] and killed her, although he was able to make it appear that she died by accident. He was then able to marry the remaining girl and brought her to Canada.
But like a fox with a chicken he caught and carries with his mouth, neither of them was really happy.
The end.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
November 20, 2025
چند ساعت از خوندنش میگذره اما این داستان از ذهن من نمیپره... باید یه ریویوی لایق و شایسته براش بنویسم و کار سختیه. لارنس هیچوقت ناامیدم نمیکنه.
June 29, 2012
This was on THE LIST. Hold on --- let me correct that punctuation.
This was on THE LIST?
I'm not entirely sure what I just read. I mean, I get that the animal fox was the foreshadowed representation of the human fox. And, I get that the proverbial fox stole the proverbial hen out of the proverbial hen house. But, the story was not engaging or very interesting. To me.
Thankfully, it was short. Here's the even shorter (abridged) version:
**********SPOILERS BELOW**********
March: I'm the pretty one.
Banford: And I'm the smart one.
March: We live together on our jointly owned farm
Banford: and share a bedroom
March: but we're not lesbians
Banford: we've just been
March: best friends forever.
Henry: Knock-Knock.
March and Banford: Who's There?
Henry: I'm the male fox.
March: Don't come in.
Banford: She's just being silly. Please, do come in. Let me make you some tea. March - go get the tea!
March: Okay.
Henry: So, you ladies live all alone?
Banford: Not anymore, cause you're gonna live here with us, right?
Henry: Awesome.
Banford: Hey! I've changed my mind. Get out.
Henry: But, I love March and we're getting married.
Banford: Is that true, March?
Henry: Say yes, March.
March: Okay.
Banford: Say no, March.
March: Okay.
Henry: I'm leaving, but when I come back, we're getting married.
~~~TWO MINUTES LATER~~~
Henry: I'm back. Unexpectedly. But, let me cut down that tree for you.
March: Okay.
Henry: I think this tree will land on Banford and kill her. Banford! Move!
Banford: I'm not afraid of you. ***tree falls on her and kills her.***
Henry: Told you.
March: *screams and cries*
Henry: So, uh, now can we get married?
March: Okay.
This was on THE LIST?
I'm not entirely sure what I just read. I mean, I get that the animal fox was the foreshadowed representation of the human fox. And, I get that the proverbial fox stole the proverbial hen out of the proverbial hen house. But, the story was not engaging or very interesting. To me.
Thankfully, it was short. Here's the even shorter (abridged) version:
**********SPOILERS BELOW**********
March: I'm the pretty one.
Banford: And I'm the smart one.
March: We live together on our jointly owned farm
Banford: and share a bedroom
March: but we're not lesbians
Banford: we've just been
March: best friends forever.
Henry: Knock-Knock.
March and Banford: Who's There?
Henry: I'm the male fox.
March: Don't come in.
Banford: She's just being silly. Please, do come in. Let me make you some tea. March - go get the tea!
March: Okay.
Henry: So, you ladies live all alone?
Banford: Not anymore, cause you're gonna live here with us, right?
Henry: Awesome.
Banford: Hey! I've changed my mind. Get out.
Henry: But, I love March and we're getting married.
Banford: Is that true, March?
Henry: Say yes, March.
March: Okay.
Banford: Say no, March.
March: Okay.
Henry: I'm leaving, but when I come back, we're getting married.
~~~TWO MINUTES LATER~~~
Henry: I'm back. Unexpectedly. But, let me cut down that tree for you.
March: Okay.
Henry: I think this tree will land on Banford and kill her. Banford! Move!
Banford: I'm not afraid of you. ***tree falls on her and kills her.***
Henry: Told you.
March: *screams and cries*
Henry: So, uh, now can we get married?
March: Okay.
January 18, 2016
دوستانِ گرانقدر، در این کتاب، سخن از مردیست که همچون روباه واردِ زندگیِ دو زن و خواهر، به نامهایِ « بنفورد» و « مارچ» میشود... و میانِ آنها قرار گرفته و از « مارچ» درخواستِ ازدواج میکند... و تشکیلِ یک « مثلث» میدهند که چیزی جز حسادت و بی حرمتی در آن دیده نمیشود... « مارچ» زنی که برایِ گذرانِ زندگی نیاز به هیچ مردی ندارد و همراه با « بنفورد»، مستقلانه زندگی میکنند
زن باید «بیدار میماند» ... باید میفهمید... باید بررسی میکرد و میسنجید و تصمیم میگرفت... باید افسارِ زندگیش را محکم به دست میگرفت...بله، باید تا آخر زنی مستقل باقی میماند، اما از همه چیز خسته شده بود، خستگیش حدی نداشت... اما مرد « به خواب رفتن» زن را میخواست... زن نباید مردانه رفتار میکرد، نباید مستقل باشد و بارِ مسئولیت هایِ مردانه را بر دوش بکشد... حتی مسئولیت در قبالِ روحِ خودش را باید به مرد واگذار میکرد... مرد سرسختانه در مقابلِ ارادۀ زن می ایستاد و انتظار میکشید تا لحظۀ تسلیم شدنِ زن فرا برسد
امیدوار پسندیده باشید
پیروز باشید و ایرانی
زن باید «بیدار میماند» ... باید میفهمید... باید بررسی میکرد و میسنجید و تصمیم میگرفت... باید افسارِ زندگیش را محکم به دست میگرفت...بله، باید تا آخر زنی مستقل باقی میماند، اما از همه چیز خسته شده بود، خستگیش حدی نداشت... اما مرد « به خواب رفتن» زن را میخواست... زن نباید مردانه رفتار میکرد، نباید مستقل باشد و بارِ مسئولیت هایِ مردانه را بر دوش بکشد... حتی مسئولیت در قبالِ روحِ خودش را باید به مرد واگذار میکرد... مرد سرسختانه در مقابلِ ارادۀ زن می ایستاد و انتظار میکشید تا لحظۀ تسلیم شدنِ زن فرا برسد
امیدوار پسندیده باشید
پیروز باشید و ایرانی
November 23, 2023
خیلی وقت بود میخواستم یه کتاب از دی اچ لارنس بخونم ولی تا حالا وقت نشده بود. نوولا روباه ما رو وارد یه فضای روستایی جالب میکنه که دو تا دختر جوون اونجا رو میگردونن و با حضور یه ادم دیگه زندگیشون متحول میشه. روباه و به طور کلی قلم لارنس مارو به چالش میکشه تا به رذائل اخلاقی و روانکاوی شخصیت ها بیشتر فکر کنیم. چند صفحه آخر منتظر یه اتفاق عجیب باشید که اصلا فکرش رو نمیکنین و خودم تا چند ساعت تو شک بودم. :)) در نهایت بعد از اون اتفاق عجیب، لارنس شروع میکنه به توصیف اخلاق و تحلیل شخصیت و روان ادما که به نظرم هم جالب بود و هم یه ذره خسته کننده. در کل از کتاب لذت برد مو همون روز رفتم سراغ کتاب جدید لارنس که افق با همین مترجم چاپ کرده به اسم باکره و کولی. امیدوارم اون هم همینقدر جالب باشه.
August 2, 2025
So, I am going to take a try.
Jill Banford and Nellie March live together on their farm, trying to make a go of it.
Jill seems to be a submissive lesbian. She is thin and frail.
The March character gives a vibe as the dominant physically stronger woman. She does the heavier chores around the farm while Jill attends to the household chores.
A masculine, handsome type of World War I soldier who is heterosexual Henry Grenfel shows up at the farm. Nellie is attracted to him.
The soldiers' eyes are intense like the eyes of the fox who has been causing problems about the farms livestock.
And now it's revealed that Nellie is obviously bi sexual as well.
It's a threesome mess. Hyper tense.
Henry is manipulating these two women. Maybe he is a covert narcissist at heart, playing with these two women and getting a big supply of fuel.
The symbolic red Fox is always lurking. The cunning and manipulative entity representing his male presence.
The rest is in the book. At the time it was written, complex sexual themes were so shrouded in symbolic kabuki.
I guess I see this as a pretty simple story of three very conflicted and manipulative people.
Jill Banford and Nellie March live together on their farm, trying to make a go of it.
Jill seems to be a submissive lesbian. She is thin and frail.
The March character gives a vibe as the dominant physically stronger woman. She does the heavier chores around the farm while Jill attends to the household chores.
A masculine, handsome type of World War I soldier who is heterosexual Henry Grenfel shows up at the farm. Nellie is attracted to him.
The soldiers' eyes are intense like the eyes of the fox who has been causing problems about the farms livestock.
And now it's revealed that Nellie is obviously bi sexual as well.
It's a threesome mess. Hyper tense.
Henry is manipulating these two women. Maybe he is a covert narcissist at heart, playing with these two women and getting a big supply of fuel.
The symbolic red Fox is always lurking. The cunning and manipulative entity representing his male presence.
The rest is in the book. At the time it was written, complex sexual themes were so shrouded in symbolic kabuki.
I guess I see this as a pretty simple story of three very conflicted and manipulative people.
December 8, 2020
179th book of 2020.
In school (an all-boys school) I had an English teacher named, ironically, Ms Heron. Her name is ironic because she set about, one year, likening my whole class to animals. Though it started as a joke, she became rather good at it, and we found ourselves all nodding and laughing each time she labelled a new boy as a certain animal. T., a boy of startling height for his age, small rectangular glasses and pinched features, was dubbed the Badger. It was surprisingly apt; Ms Heron went on to tell us it was way he sat at the back of the classroom with his arms folded over his belly (a little like a middle-aged man’s pot belly) that gave him the wise look of a badger. There’s no way to explain how this made him look like a badger, but it did. Always beside T., was S., who was titled the Owl; this was for obvious reasons: his eyes looked large behind his strong-lensed glasses, which were almost perfectly round, like an owl’s eyes. J., excitable, mischievous, long-armed and impish in the face was tagged as Lemur. My childhood friend, autistic, quiet, slow-mannered and rather absent, became, naturally, Sloth. I eventually became Mouse, or Rat, for I was small, skinny and had a slightly upturned-nose. Ms Heron herself wasn’t quite a Heron, as her name suggested. Over the years I’ve often wondered what she would be. She was tall, burly, and had served previously in the military as a vehicle-driver. Once, to us boys’ amazement, she had driven an infantry truck over a landmine in Afghanistan which had flipped the vehicle, but harmed no one. Bear isn’t quite fitting for her, but it’s close. Perhaps lioness would be more fitting. She did, however, stand at the front of the class with military-like posture and surveyed us expressionlessly when we were working, erect and watchful as a Heron.
A long prelude, but this novella centres around the interesting comparison between a fox and a soldier, Henry Grenfel. The latter arrives at a farm in 1918 where two women, March and Banford live. Before Henry arrives, it is set up that they have been having trouble with a fox—it is sneaking about, eluding them, and terrorising their hens. They try and kill it, but they to no avail. Then, enter: Henry. He reminds March of the fox and Lawrence masterfully draws us into this comparison; Henry is described as having a snout-like face, a nose that wrinkles like a puppy’s (or a fox’s?) when he laughs, and especially near the end, he moves stealthily about, and above all, he is cunning. Stylistically, Lawrence also describes eyes with great emphasis, we are always being told about the characters’ eyes. And, oddly, that makes me think of a fox, or an animal even more, like S.’s owl eyes at school.
It’s a triangle relationship story, with love involved. Not kind love, either. Lawrence, from what I’ve read so far, appears to me as a cynic. The end of the novella becomes a reflection on how unattainable happiness is. It’s extraordinarily written; he could write, that’s for certain. The story takes a dark turn, and ends on a depressing note. The concept of Henry and the fox being similar is the driving spark to the piece that made it interesting, without which, it would have been a fairly bland and banal story. And the fox as this almost abstract character, elusive, stalking in the night, and the screeching, or singing, as Lawrence calls it, is a great plot device. I live in a residential English town and am kept up at night frequently by the screeching of foxes, that sound terrifyingly like women screaming in the darkness.
And suddenly it seemed to him England was little and tight, he felt the landscape was constricted even in the dark, and that there were too many dogs in the night, making noise like a fence of sound, like the network of English hedges netting the view.
And then—a shadow. A sliding shadow in the gateway. He gathered all his vision into a concentrated spark, and saw the shadow of the fox, the fox creeping on his belly through the gate.
But to March he was the fox. Whether it was the thrusting forward of his head, or the glisten of fine whitish hairs on the ruddy cheek-bones, or the bright, keen eyes, that can never be said: but the boy was to her the fox, and she could not see him otherwise.
In school (an all-boys school) I had an English teacher named, ironically, Ms Heron. Her name is ironic because she set about, one year, likening my whole class to animals. Though it started as a joke, she became rather good at it, and we found ourselves all nodding and laughing each time she labelled a new boy as a certain animal. T., a boy of startling height for his age, small rectangular glasses and pinched features, was dubbed the Badger. It was surprisingly apt; Ms Heron went on to tell us it was way he sat at the back of the classroom with his arms folded over his belly (a little like a middle-aged man’s pot belly) that gave him the wise look of a badger. There’s no way to explain how this made him look like a badger, but it did. Always beside T., was S., who was titled the Owl; this was for obvious reasons: his eyes looked large behind his strong-lensed glasses, which were almost perfectly round, like an owl’s eyes. J., excitable, mischievous, long-armed and impish in the face was tagged as Lemur. My childhood friend, autistic, quiet, slow-mannered and rather absent, became, naturally, Sloth. I eventually became Mouse, or Rat, for I was small, skinny and had a slightly upturned-nose. Ms Heron herself wasn’t quite a Heron, as her name suggested. Over the years I’ve often wondered what she would be. She was tall, burly, and had served previously in the military as a vehicle-driver. Once, to us boys’ amazement, she had driven an infantry truck over a landmine in Afghanistan which had flipped the vehicle, but harmed no one. Bear isn’t quite fitting for her, but it’s close. Perhaps lioness would be more fitting. She did, however, stand at the front of the class with military-like posture and surveyed us expressionlessly when we were working, erect and watchful as a Heron.
A long prelude, but this novella centres around the interesting comparison between a fox and a soldier, Henry Grenfel. The latter arrives at a farm in 1918 where two women, March and Banford live. Before Henry arrives, it is set up that they have been having trouble with a fox—it is sneaking about, eluding them, and terrorising their hens. They try and kill it, but they to no avail. Then, enter: Henry. He reminds March of the fox and Lawrence masterfully draws us into this comparison; Henry is described as having a snout-like face, a nose that wrinkles like a puppy’s (or a fox’s?) when he laughs, and especially near the end, he moves stealthily about, and above all, he is cunning. Stylistically, Lawrence also describes eyes with great emphasis, we are always being told about the characters’ eyes. And, oddly, that makes me think of a fox, or an animal even more, like S.’s owl eyes at school.
It’s a triangle relationship story, with love involved. Not kind love, either. Lawrence, from what I’ve read so far, appears to me as a cynic. The end of the novella becomes a reflection on how unattainable happiness is. It’s extraordinarily written; he could write, that’s for certain. The story takes a dark turn, and ends on a depressing note. The concept of Henry and the fox being similar is the driving spark to the piece that made it interesting, without which, it would have been a fairly bland and banal story. And the fox as this almost abstract character, elusive, stalking in the night, and the screeching, or singing, as Lawrence calls it, is a great plot device. I live in a residential English town and am kept up at night frequently by the screeching of foxes, that sound terrifyingly like women screaming in the darkness.
And suddenly it seemed to him England was little and tight, he felt the landscape was constricted even in the dark, and that there were too many dogs in the night, making noise like a fence of sound, like the network of English hedges netting the view.
And then—a shadow. A sliding shadow in the gateway. He gathered all his vision into a concentrated spark, and saw the shadow of the fox, the fox creeping on his belly through the gate.
But to March he was the fox. Whether it was the thrusting forward of his head, or the glisten of fine whitish hairs on the ruddy cheek-bones, or the bright, keen eyes, that can never be said: but the boy was to her the fox, and she could not see him otherwise.
December 14, 2008
After a certain age (perhaps 30? perhaps as early as 20?), one probably shouldn't read too much of DH Lawrence's writing, or too little of it. Now and again I return to his fiction, poetry, and essays either to reread something or take on a new work. He's a unique, over-the-top, incantatory, powerful writer whose contribution to human psychology remains unverified by almost anyone else. When I say this I'm not referring to his exploitation of oedipal themes, per Freud (Sons and Lovers), but of course his notions about blood consciousness, a metaphysical conviction that he reduces to this primitive image: something in the blood that binds people together, tears them apart, gives them ecstasy in being subjugated (or the reverse), and fills their spiritual nostrils with scents of both liberation and damnation.
Leaving that explicit formulation (blood consciousness) and its typical instantiation (a struggle between men and women)aside, I'm left with the peculiar intimate force of Lawrence's writing, which in small doses does achieve a kind of supplemental echo, boosting the force of the narrative and creating, for me at least, a heightened sense that ordinary life is a high stakes game.
How does he do it? In rereading The Fox the other day, I commented to myself how often Lawrence repeated certain words, particularly in passages where the lead female protagonist, is striving for understanding through self-castigation. The words in these passages were, over and over again, "failure," "responsibility," and "reaching," either repeated exactly or slightly altered, so that "failure" might become "failing," or "reaching" might become "reach.
This is very tiny stuff, but more than "style." It struck me that Lawrence was using prose to replicate "how we think" not through stream-of-consciousness, per se, but in an equally interesting, and perhaps more powerful way. March hates the way she feels she has let her friend Jill down and comes so easily under the sway of the fox-killing Henry. She doesn't simply reach a conclusion about this, however. In Lawrence's hands, she broods about it, endures it, and repeats it to herself the way one does over time (days, weeks, or months of a crisis that won't let you alone). And Lawrence achieves this mood through his gnawing, stuck repetitions, drawing you in.
The paradox and the irony of The Fox as a powerful novella is that Henry gets March for himself, but in the process, he kills her, as he killed the fox, and as he also kills Jill.
This is all murky and suspect, and yet, because March resigns herself to a living death at Henry's side, it has the quality of something more real than real. A splendid novel.
Leaving that explicit formulation (blood consciousness) and its typical instantiation (a struggle between men and women)aside, I'm left with the peculiar intimate force of Lawrence's writing, which in small doses does achieve a kind of supplemental echo, boosting the force of the narrative and creating, for me at least, a heightened sense that ordinary life is a high stakes game.
How does he do it? In rereading The Fox the other day, I commented to myself how often Lawrence repeated certain words, particularly in passages where the lead female protagonist, is striving for understanding through self-castigation. The words in these passages were, over and over again, "failure," "responsibility," and "reaching," either repeated exactly or slightly altered, so that "failure" might become "failing," or "reaching" might become "reach.
This is very tiny stuff, but more than "style." It struck me that Lawrence was using prose to replicate "how we think" not through stream-of-consciousness, per se, but in an equally interesting, and perhaps more powerful way. March hates the way she feels she has let her friend Jill down and comes so easily under the sway of the fox-killing Henry. She doesn't simply reach a conclusion about this, however. In Lawrence's hands, she broods about it, endures it, and repeats it to herself the way one does over time (days, weeks, or months of a crisis that won't let you alone). And Lawrence achieves this mood through his gnawing, stuck repetitions, drawing you in.
The paradox and the irony of The Fox as a powerful novella is that Henry gets March for himself, but in the process, he kills her, as he killed the fox, and as he also kills Jill.
This is all murky and suspect, and yet, because March resigns herself to a living death at Henry's side, it has the quality of something more real than real. A splendid novel.
November 8, 2017
Ο Ντ. Χ. Λόρενς είναι κυρίως γνωστός για το "Ο εραστής της λαίδης Τσάτερλι" και το "Γιοι και εραστές", όμως εγώ επέλεξα την (όχι και τόσο πολυδιαβασμένη) μικρή αυτή νουβέλα, για πρώτη γνωριμία με το έργο του. Τίμησα την προσφορά της Πολιτείας και αγόρασα χθες το βιβλίο, και σήμερα το μεσημεράκι το άρχισα και το τελείωσα μέσα σ'ένα δίωρο. Η βαθμολογία του βιβλίου στο Goodreads μείωσε κάπως τις προσδοκίες μου πριν το πιάσω στα χέρια μου, παρ'όλα αυτά δεν πέρασα και άσχημα. Διάβασα μια ενδιαφέρουσα και ατμοσφαιρική ιστορία και σε κανένα σημείο δεν βαρέθηκα, ούτε κουράστηκα. Η αλήθεια είναι ότι ήθελα να δω πως θα καταλήξει το όλο δράμα. Δυο ανύπαντρες γυναίκες, η Μπάνφορντ και η Μαρτς, ζουν σ'ένα μικρό αγρόκτημα στην επαρχιακή Αγγλία, κατά τα τέλη του Α' Παγκοσμίου Πολέμου. Συναντούν πολλές δυσκολίες, αλλά η σχέση τους είναι πολύ στενή και ισχυρή και καταφέρνουν να τις αντιμετωπίζουν με πείσμα. Μια μέρα, όμως, μπαίνει στην ζωή τους ένας νεαρός άντρας, ο Χένρι, ο οποίος θα αλλάξει τις ισορροπίες, από την στιγμή που αυτός και η Μαρτς θα νιώσουν μια έντονη έλξη ο ένας για τον άλλον. Σίγουρα είναι ένα βιβλίο που δείχνει λίγο τα χρόνια του, όμως κάτι στην γραφή μου έκανε καλή εντύπωση. Οι περιγραφές των τοπίων και της καθημερινότητας των πρωταγωνιστριών, οι διάλογοι, η σκιαγράφηση των χαρακτήρων, ήταν στοιχεία που με έμπασαν για τα καλά στον μικρόκοσμο της νουβέλας. Πρόσημο θετικό.
May 23, 2014
3.5 It has been a very long time since I have read anything by this author. The Fox, is a novella that I happened to own.
It chronicles the lifestyle of two, rather different women, at the turn of 1900's. March and Bagwell, want to live alone on a farm that primarily raises chickens. Not only is this frowned on during that time period, but these women know next to nothing about farming or chickens. Another challenge they must deal with is the war, which has made feed and other necessities difficult to come by. Also surprise, surprise a fox is killing their chickens one by one.
Into this mix comes a ex-soldier who sees a golden opportunity. Hence the fox in the hen house will have a dual meaning.
A rather good story, suspenseful because even though it is easy to guess, given the title. A story about greed and power, still stands the test of time.
It chronicles the lifestyle of two, rather different women, at the turn of 1900's. March and Bagwell, want to live alone on a farm that primarily raises chickens. Not only is this frowned on during that time period, but these women know next to nothing about farming or chickens. Another challenge they must deal with is the war, which has made feed and other necessities difficult to come by. Also surprise, surprise a fox is killing their chickens one by one.
Into this mix comes a ex-soldier who sees a golden opportunity. Hence the fox in the hen house will have a dual meaning.
A rather good story, suspenseful because even though it is easy to guess, given the title. A story about greed and power, still stands the test of time.
May 31, 2015
Four and a half.
Two women, Banford and March, are trying to independently run a small farm together and slowly failing in their efforts. The war is just over and soldiers are returning home. There have been cases of the great flu epidemic in the nearby village, so it must be set around 1919, and people are struggling with post war problems including poor food and a cold winter. They are both becoming despondent and fearful for the future.
A fox keeps stealing their chickens and they decide it must be shot. He is too clever for them! March, the stronger of the two women, begins a campaign to kill this animal and in a chance meeting with the fox she becomes fixated with him and unable to cause him harm. She feels his power dominating her spirit.
A young soldier returning from the war, looking for somewhere to stay and work, arrives and is tentatively allowed to stay. He is impudent, daring and unsettling, like the fox, and he has his own plans to cause disruption.
Lawrence's story is an allegory of sexuality and power. It is full of atmosphere and hidden meaning. A power struggle begins and there will be a victim. This short story was very clever and distinctive. I'm still thinking about it.
Two women, Banford and March, are trying to independently run a small farm together and slowly failing in their efforts. The war is just over and soldiers are returning home. There have been cases of the great flu epidemic in the nearby village, so it must be set around 1919, and people are struggling with post war problems including poor food and a cold winter. They are both becoming despondent and fearful for the future.
A fox keeps stealing their chickens and they decide it must be shot. He is too clever for them! March, the stronger of the two women, begins a campaign to kill this animal and in a chance meeting with the fox she becomes fixated with him and unable to cause him harm. She feels his power dominating her spirit.
A young soldier returning from the war, looking for somewhere to stay and work, arrives and is tentatively allowed to stay. He is impudent, daring and unsettling, like the fox, and he has his own plans to cause disruption.
Lawrence's story is an allegory of sexuality and power. It is full of atmosphere and hidden meaning. A power struggle begins and there will be a victim. This short story was very clever and distinctive. I'm still thinking about it.
March 4, 2021
Che ce fo (? - 1)
La Volpe è un canide dotato di grande capacità di adattamento, in grado di sopravvivere nelle più varie condizioni ambientali e di sfruttare le più disparate fonti alimentari. Queste caratteristiche l’hanno resa, nell’immaginario collettivo, simbolo di astuzia e furbizia e su di lei sono state tramandate molte storie in bilico tra favola e mito.
http://vecchiosalice.altervista.org/s...
La volpe di questo racconto è una proiezione sessuale che inquieta due donne trentenni gestrici di una fattoria in Cornovaglia durante la Grande Guerra. Il rapporto fra queste due donne è ambiguo, Lawrence non scrive mai che siano amanti, lo lascia però intendere al lettore. La volpe preda il loro pollame, la volpe si umanizza nei panni di un giovane soldato in congedo che chiede asilo nella fattoria. Una delle due donne lo sovrappone alla volpe e nel passo sicuramente più intenso del libro dice di aver sognato l'animale che
..le passava sul viso la coda che «le faceva bruciare e ardere la bocca come se andasse a fuoco».
Sentite poi che cosa si dice in merito all'odore:
la sua mente era dominata sicuramente dall’antico incanto della volpe che l’aveva colta nel momento in cui l’animale l’aveva guardata. Era come se potesse sentirne l’odore in quei momenti. E quest’odore tornava nei momenti più inaspettati, proprio mentre andava a dormire di sera, o mentre versava l’acqua nella teiera per fare il tè… era la volpe, e l’odore la dominava come d’incanto.
…si curvò verso di essa e fu colta dal suo odore ferino.
L’odore della volpe ottant’anni dopo è stato processato
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CUjIe...
L'irruzione del soldato sulla scena pare che inizialmente fosse stata concepita come l’epilogo.
Lawrence nel 1921 scrisse all’amico Earl Brewster: «Ho aggiunto alla Volpe una lunga coda…»
Purtroppo la coda posticcia, lunga come uno strascico, deteriora la narrazione, la volpe se la pesta, il soldato smette di essere il suo alter ego e si trasforma nel..
No, non dirò in che cosa si trasforma, ma solo che nel momento in cui il racconto diventa romanzo breve, Lawrence sente la necessità di dargli anche una dimensione morale.
Le prime trenta pagine meritano molto di più delle novanta successive.
Colonna sonora inevitabile:
(? - 1) Catch the fox
https://youtu.be/XiyDdyg5qKE
La Volpe è un canide dotato di grande capacità di adattamento, in grado di sopravvivere nelle più varie condizioni ambientali e di sfruttare le più disparate fonti alimentari. Queste caratteristiche l’hanno resa, nell’immaginario collettivo, simbolo di astuzia e furbizia e su di lei sono state tramandate molte storie in bilico tra favola e mito.
http://vecchiosalice.altervista.org/s...
La volpe di questo racconto è una proiezione sessuale che inquieta due donne trentenni gestrici di una fattoria in Cornovaglia durante la Grande Guerra. Il rapporto fra queste due donne è ambiguo, Lawrence non scrive mai che siano amanti, lo lascia però intendere al lettore. La volpe preda il loro pollame, la volpe si umanizza nei panni di un giovane soldato in congedo che chiede asilo nella fattoria. Una delle due donne lo sovrappone alla volpe e nel passo sicuramente più intenso del libro dice di aver sognato l'animale che
..le passava sul viso la coda che «le faceva bruciare e ardere la bocca come se andasse a fuoco».
Sentite poi che cosa si dice in merito all'odore:
la sua mente era dominata sicuramente dall’antico incanto della volpe che l’aveva colta nel momento in cui l’animale l’aveva guardata. Era come se potesse sentirne l’odore in quei momenti. E quest’odore tornava nei momenti più inaspettati, proprio mentre andava a dormire di sera, o mentre versava l’acqua nella teiera per fare il tè… era la volpe, e l’odore la dominava come d’incanto.
…si curvò verso di essa e fu colta dal suo odore ferino.
L’odore della volpe ottant’anni dopo è stato processato
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CUjIe...
L'irruzione del soldato sulla scena pare che inizialmente fosse stata concepita come l’epilogo.
Lawrence nel 1921 scrisse all’amico Earl Brewster: «Ho aggiunto alla Volpe una lunga coda…»
Purtroppo la coda posticcia, lunga come uno strascico, deteriora la narrazione, la volpe se la pesta, il soldato smette di essere il suo alter ego e si trasforma nel..
No, non dirò in che cosa si trasforma, ma solo che nel momento in cui il racconto diventa romanzo breve, Lawrence sente la necessità di dargli anche una dimensione morale.
Le prime trenta pagine meritano molto di più delle novanta successive.
Colonna sonora inevitabile:
(? - 1) Catch the fox
https://youtu.be/XiyDdyg5qKE
October 6, 2008
D.H. Lawrence's prose is often described as 'muscular', which I think is another way of saying 'mostly bullshit'. Very forgettable. Don't bother.
February 17, 2024
داستان دربارهی دو دوست هستش که در روستا زندگی میکنند و در آستانهی سی سالگی با پرورش طیور امرار معاش میکنند. در این بین آمدن روباهی از جنگل و سرقت مرغهاشون باعث میشه تمام هوش و حواسشون رو برای پیدا کردن و شکار روباه بذارن.
در این بین پسری میاد خونهشون(که طبیعتا میشه نماد روباهی که در جلد انسانی رفته) که باعث میشه مثلثی از احساسات متناقض در بین این سه نفر شکل بگیره.
باید اعتراف کنم شرح و بیان احساسات این سه نفر علیالخصوص هنری(پسر تازه آمده) واقعا عالی بود تا جایی که تا داستان رو تموم نکردم کتاب رو زمین نذاشتم. اما متاسفانه نمیدونم نویسندهی محترم وقتی میبیند کتابش خوب نوشته شده و پیش رفته چرا بیاد اون اواخر کتاب حتما باید بزند صحرای کربلا!
بزرگوار اون چند صفحهی آخر بسان آخوندی دهان گشاد رفته بالای منبر و تمام مردان را استسمارگر زنان و زنان را دلیل سعادت بشری شمرده. یعنی یک حرفهای مزخرف یک حرفهای مهمل که فقط و فقط از فمنیستهای گوسالهی قرن حاضر میشه شنید.
ولی با وجود این ارزش خوندن داره و ای کاش اون چند صفحهی آخر اینطور نبود.
در این بین پسری میاد خونهشون(که طبیعتا میشه نماد روباهی که در جلد انسانی رفته) که باعث میشه مثلثی از احساسات متناقض در بین این سه نفر شکل بگیره.
باید اعتراف کنم شرح و بیان احساسات این سه نفر علیالخصوص هنری(پسر تازه آمده) واقعا عالی بود تا جایی که تا داستان رو تموم نکردم کتاب رو زمین نذاشتم. اما متاسفانه نمیدونم نویسندهی محترم وقتی میبیند کتابش خوب نوشته شده و پیش رفته چرا بیاد اون اواخر کتاب حتما باید بزند صحرای کربلا!
بزرگوار اون چند صفحهی آخر بسان آخوندی دهان گشاد رفته بالای منبر و تمام مردان را استسمارگر زنان و زنان را دلیل سعادت بشری شمرده. یعنی یک حرفهای مزخرف یک حرفهای مهمل که فقط و فقط از فمنیستهای گوسالهی قرن حاضر میشه شنید.
ولی با وجود این ارزش خوندن داره و ای کاش اون چند صفحهی آخر اینطور نبود.
September 27, 2023
David Herbert Lawrence [1885-1930] nonostante la morte in giovane età scrisse numerose opere e “La Volpe” del 1930 racconta la difficile storia d’amore tra il giovane Henry reduce della I Guerra Mondiale e Ellen March una non più giovane donna che con l’amica Till Bandford si é allontanata volontariamente dalla città per porta avanti una fattoria poco produttiva.
Le due donne sono legate da una profonda amicizia che la convivenza e le difficili condizioni di vita a fine conflitto hanno rafforzato, ma il giovane soldato infatuato di Ellen cercherà con ostinazione di insinuarsi tra di loro, di spezzare il vincolo di amicizia, di allontanare le due amiche in maniera definitiva.
Lawrence dimostra anche in questo romanzo breve le sue doti di scrittore e di conoscitore dell’animo umano, raccontando con bravura le tensioni che spingono la volontà di un uomo verso la donna e lo sforzo di lei per resistere al richiamo dell'amore maschile e l'abbandonarsi ad esso.
Le due donne sono legate da una profonda amicizia che la convivenza e le difficili condizioni di vita a fine conflitto hanno rafforzato, ma il giovane soldato infatuato di Ellen cercherà con ostinazione di insinuarsi tra di loro, di spezzare il vincolo di amicizia, di allontanare le due amiche in maniera definitiva.
Lawrence dimostra anche in questo romanzo breve le sue doti di scrittore e di conoscitore dell’animo umano, raccontando con bravura le tensioni che spingono la volontà di un uomo verso la donna e lo sforzo di lei per resistere al richiamo dell'amore maschile e l'abbandonarsi ad esso.
July 11, 2022
The DH Lawrence novella about two girls, Banford and March, whose existence is terminally interrupted by the arrival of a soldier, whose grandfather lived on the farm that the girls are working five years previously before WWI began.
Banford and March had taken the farm together intending to work it all by themselves. Banford is small, thin, and delicate but is the principal investor in the farm. March is stronger and more robust and has carpentry and joinery skills.
Prior to the soldier arriving, March has the chance to shoot a fox that's eating their fowl, but she hasn't the nerve to pull the trigger. When the soldier arrives, he has a powerful effect on March, provoking a stirring of dormant desire...
Banford and March had taken the farm together intending to work it all by themselves. Banford is small, thin, and delicate but is the principal investor in the farm. March is stronger and more robust and has carpentry and joinery skills.
Prior to the soldier arriving, March has the chance to shoot a fox that's eating their fowl, but she hasn't the nerve to pull the trigger. When the soldier arrives, he has a powerful effect on March, provoking a stirring of dormant desire...
October 2, 2012
I love this story. It seems people either love or hate D.H. Lawrence, well I am slightly obsessed with him, and this story is a good example of why. His descriptions, symbolism and metaphors are just insanely beautiful, in my opinion. I am so drawn into his work and his writing style. I love the strange way he repeats things, the way he leaves you hanging, leaving it out there, so that you can wrap your mind around it and mold it yourself. Sometimes I will read just a simple sentence or two from his work and think--Wow. Yes, exactly. incredible... It amazes me he was able to spit out lauguage so profoundly beautiful.
August 8, 2014
زن با تمام وجود می کوشد ، می کوشد تا مرد را خوشبخت کند ، تا حد توانایی اش برای آسودگی دنیا و آدم هایش تلاش می کند و همیشه سهمش جز شکست و ناکامی نیست
May 5, 2018
//روباه
دی اچ لارنس
کاوه میر عباسی
نشر باغ نو(۱۳۸۲)
۱۰۴صفحه
دو زن در روستایی دور از شهر در کلبه ای با هم زندگی میکنند.یکی جدی ،خشن و مردانه است و دیگری ارام و لطیف.ان دو زندگی ارامی دارند و بنا به اشاراتی میفهمیم که با هم روابط عاشقانه و همجنسگرایانه دارند .دو اتفاق زندگی را برای هر دوشان تغییر میدهد.اول ورود روباهی کوچک ،باهوش و سارق به مزرعه و دیگری ورود مردی خشن ،جنایت کار و هرزه به زندگی مشترک ان دو .و اینچنین ۴ راس هرمی فراهم میشود که لارنس به بهانه حضور نمادین روباه در مزرعه و در راس هرم مسایل جنسی و ارتباطات این مثلث عشقی(عشق زن به زن،عشق مرد به زن ،تنفر مرد و زن و حسادت سه راس )و خوی حیوانی انها را در قاعده هرم می شکافد.
دی اچ لارنس
کاوه میر عباسی
نشر باغ نو(۱۳۸۲)
۱۰۴صفحه
دو زن در روستایی دور از شهر در کلبه ای با هم زندگی میکنند.یکی جدی ،خشن و مردانه است و دیگری ارام و لطیف.ان دو زندگی ارامی دارند و بنا به اشاراتی میفهمیم که با هم روابط عاشقانه و همجنسگرایانه دارند .دو اتفاق زندگی را برای هر دوشان تغییر میدهد.اول ورود روباهی کوچک ،باهوش و سارق به مزرعه و دیگری ورود مردی خشن ،جنایت کار و هرزه به زندگی مشترک ان دو .و اینچنین ۴ راس هرمی فراهم میشود که لارنس به بهانه حضور نمادین روباه در مزرعه و در راس هرم مسایل جنسی و ارتباطات این مثلث عشقی(عشق زن به زن،عشق مرد به زن ،تنفر مرد و زن و حسادت سه راس )و خوی حیوانی انها را در قاعده هرم می شکافد.
April 5, 2017
I'm not sure what to say about this story. It's on the Boxall 1001 list, but I don't understand why. It hasn't aged well, and surely it must have been seen as preposterous even when it was first published. I try to avoid talking about plot in my reviews, but here I cannot avoid it. You've been warned, spoilers ahead. I will, however, not reveal the ending.
Two women who are clearly a couple decide to run a farm together. One woman is sickly and frail, but gets bankrolled by daddy so she can buy the farm. The other woman is mannish in looks, except her pretty face, and handy with carpentry and heavy lifting. But they know nothing about farming, and because they are women they are so bad at it they can't even get the chickens to lay eggs. Also because they are women, they want to have their fun and not work so hard. Their idea of fun appears to be embroidery, imbibing tea, and staring vacantly into the distance.
The women (called "girls" throughout, even though they are almost 30) also have trouble with a fox who keeps stealing the chickens. Mannish girl wants to shoot it, but when she encounters it she has what appears to be a mystical experience which leads to even more vacant staring. Now enter a young man with round boyish eyes in his ruddy round boyish face, which rests upon rounded shoulders. He's a total layabout and just wants to go shooting all the time, but he decides he would like to own the farm, and figures he should marry the mannish girl. So he whines and cajoles, and physically restrains her and begs until she says okay. She is utterly obsessed with the fox and is convinced that the boy and the fox are the same. This leads her to look and act like a deer caught in headlights and saps her of all will. She now agrees to everything and anything.
Ruddy boy: Marry me, marry me marry me!
Mannish girl: Okay
Sickly girl (jealous): You can't marry him! You're with me!
Mannish girl: Okay
Ruddy boy (angry sulk): You promised! Say you'll marry me!
Mannish girl: Okay
And so they carry on for a while, except that mannish girl puts on a dress, which makes the boy fully realise that she is a woman and as such available to him in a way that she wasn't in trousers. This realisation somehow makes him transition from boy to man but also makes him less keen to sleep with her. Go figure. But he obsessively decides that he will marry her, because he has made up his mind to. And he won't be thwarted! So there.
At this point of course the reader has quite a few questions. Who will win the battle for Vague Mannish Girl? Will Vague Mannish Girl regain her ability to actually make a decision? Will the chickens start laying eggs now that there's a man at the farm? Is the Boy really a fox? At night perhaps, like in a fairy tale? Or a sort of were-fox? Will Mannish Girl become convinced that the Boy is the Fox and shoot him in a vague fit of erotic panic?
Sadly the answer to most of these questions is no. As for the rest, well, I said I wouldn't give the ending away. Go read it yourself. It only runs to around 100 pages, so it's less agonizing to get through than the other books D. H. Lawrence has on the 1001-list. Then again, you can just read some of the other reviews that give the ending away, and then go find another 1001-book. If you think you might not get through them all in your lifetime anyway, this one is fine to skip.
Two women who are clearly a couple decide to run a farm together. One woman is sickly and frail, but gets bankrolled by daddy so she can buy the farm. The other woman is mannish in looks, except her pretty face, and handy with carpentry and heavy lifting. But they know nothing about farming, and because they are women they are so bad at it they can't even get the chickens to lay eggs. Also because they are women, they want to have their fun and not work so hard. Their idea of fun appears to be embroidery, imbibing tea, and staring vacantly into the distance.
The women (called "girls" throughout, even though they are almost 30) also have trouble with a fox who keeps stealing the chickens. Mannish girl wants to shoot it, but when she encounters it she has what appears to be a mystical experience which leads to even more vacant staring. Now enter a young man with round boyish eyes in his ruddy round boyish face, which rests upon rounded shoulders. He's a total layabout and just wants to go shooting all the time, but he decides he would like to own the farm, and figures he should marry the mannish girl. So he whines and cajoles, and physically restrains her and begs until she says okay. She is utterly obsessed with the fox and is convinced that the boy and the fox are the same. This leads her to look and act like a deer caught in headlights and saps her of all will. She now agrees to everything and anything.
Ruddy boy: Marry me, marry me marry me!
Mannish girl: Okay
Sickly girl (jealous): You can't marry him! You're with me!
Mannish girl: Okay
Ruddy boy (angry sulk): You promised! Say you'll marry me!
Mannish girl: Okay
And so they carry on for a while, except that mannish girl puts on a dress, which makes the boy fully realise that she is a woman and as such available to him in a way that she wasn't in trousers. This realisation somehow makes him transition from boy to man but also makes him less keen to sleep with her. Go figure. But he obsessively decides that he will marry her, because he has made up his mind to. And he won't be thwarted! So there.
At this point of course the reader has quite a few questions. Who will win the battle for Vague Mannish Girl? Will Vague Mannish Girl regain her ability to actually make a decision? Will the chickens start laying eggs now that there's a man at the farm? Is the Boy really a fox? At night perhaps, like in a fairy tale? Or a sort of were-fox? Will Mannish Girl become convinced that the Boy is the Fox and shoot him in a vague fit of erotic panic?
Sadly the answer to most of these questions is no. As for the rest, well, I said I wouldn't give the ending away. Go read it yourself. It only runs to around 100 pages, so it's less agonizing to get through than the other books D. H. Lawrence has on the 1001-list. Then again, you can just read some of the other reviews that give the ending away, and then go find another 1001-book. If you think you might not get through them all in your lifetime anyway, this one is fine to skip.
December 8, 2017
Τον διαβόητο Εραστή του Λώρενς στα κλεφτά τον διάβασα, σε μια έκδοση που είχα αγοράσει έφηβος από πάγκο στον δρόμο –αφού είχα δει την ταινία(;) – και νομίζω ότι είχε ένθετες φωτογραφίες με κάποιες σκηνές της ταινίας (μπορώ πάντως να τις ανασύρω από το ταμιείον). Αλλά για ευνόητους λόγους δεν έδωσα έμφαση στη λογοτεχνικότητά του. Αργότερα οι Γιοι κι εραστές με είχαν εντυπωσιάσει, αλλά δεν θα το ξανάπιανα. Και καθώς χρόνια περιμένουν για ανάγνωση τα Complete Poems του, τα ξεφύλλισα τελευταία και βρήκα κάποια ωραία ποιήματα, από τα τελευταία του, για το κακό και τον θάνατο. Με αυτά στο μυαλό, έτυχα σε άλλον πάγκο (βιβλιοπωλείου αυτή τη φορά) μισοτιμής το βιβλίο και, καθότι ένα αλεπουδάκι πάντα προκαλεί, το αγόρασα και δεν έχασα (παρά λίγο χρόνο).
Η εύθραστη Μαρτς (παρότι March, του αγρού και όχι του πολέμου) και η αρρενωπή (αλλά υπερευαίσθητη) Μπάνφορντ, κοντά στα τριάντα, συζούν σε ένα αγρόκτημα, ταπεινό και όχι ιδιαίτερα προσοδοφόρο, κάπου στην Αγγλία. «Είχαν ένα όμορφο σπίτι και θα έπρεπε να ήσαν ευτυχισμένες. Μόνο που μέσα τους ένιωθαν κάποια αηδία για τον τρόπο που ζούσαν, για την παράξενη επιμονή τους να μείνουν ανέραστες». Τα κουτσοκαταφέρνουν εκτρέφοντας κυρίως κότες. Τίποτε το τρομερό δεν ταράζει το αργό κύλισμα της ζωής μέσα στη φύση. Εκτός από κάτι: Ένας είναι ο εχθρός τους, εκτός από όλα τα άλλα, μια αλεπού, που –παρά τις προφυλάξεις– όλο και τα καταφέρνει και τρυπώνει και κάνει τη ζημιά. Και σκοπός τους να την εξολοθρεύσουν.
Κι όμως: όταν τα μαύρα μάτια της οπλισμένης Μαρτς καρφώνονται από τα μάτια της αλεπούς, ένιωσε μαγεμένη: «βαθιά μέσα της ήξερε ότι την γνώριζε […] ο τρόπος που την είχε κοιτάξει [η αλεπού] έμοιαζε να είχε κυριεύσει το μυαλό της. Αισθάνθηκε ότι το ζώο γινόταν ο κυρίαρχος του μυαλού της […] κυριαρχούσε στο υποσυνείδητό της». Ό,τι κι αν έκανε, «στο μυαλό της ερχόταν η γνωστή γοητεία της αλεπούς, εκείνη που την είχε τυλίξει όταν το ζώο την κοίταξε κατάματα. Ήταν σαν να το μύριζε εκείνες τις στιγμές. Και ερχόταν ξανά και ξανά, σε στιγμές που δεν το περίμενε, όπως όταν πήγαινε να κοιμηθεί το βράδυ, ή όταν έριχνε το νερό στην τσαγιέρα»….
Και σαν να μην έφτανε αυτή η αλεπού, ένα βράδυ, με σίγουρα βήματα και συρτή, μαλακή και χαμηλή φωνή εισβάλλει στο σπίτι ένας άντρας, κι η Μαρτς έμεινε να τον κοιτά γοητευμένη (ένα θέμα με τη γοητεία του απρόσμενου το είχε η κοπελιά). Είχε έρθει από αλλού, «από τη Θεσσαλονίκη» για την ακρίβεια (κι όμως!!! –από το μακεδονικό μέτωπο). Κι αρχίζει ένα γαϊτανάκι συναισθημάτων και συγκρούσεων ανάμεσα στις δυο γυναίκες και τον άντρα που τάραξε την ησυχία τους, με την Μαρτς το βράδυ να ονειρεύεται να την χαϊδεύει η φουντωτή ουρά της αλεπούς και το πρωί να βλέπει τον Χένρυ στο λιβάδι σαν αλεπού. «Δεν ήρθα να σου κλέψω τα κοτόπουλα», της ρίχνει παιχνιδιάρικα και την αποτελειώνει(;). Και πού τελειώνει το συμβολικό και πού το πραγματικό; (η χαρά της ψυχαναλυτικής κριτικής). Η συνέχεια επί του χάρτου (και επί του χόρτου;) είναι χορταστική :), όσο το επιτρέπει μια νουβέλα -αλλά εκτός αυτής της κριτικής.
Καθώς έχει τελειώσει η ιστορία (δεν έχει σημασία πώς), ο Λώρενς κρίνει σκόπιμο να αφιερώσει μερικές σελίδες με σκέψεις του αφηγητή για την ιστορία και την εξέλιξή της. Είναι οι τελευταίες που διαβάζονται και τις θυμάσαι ως πιο πρόσφατες, αλλά δεν θα πρέπει να μας παρεξηγήσει ο καλός μας συγγραφέας αν είναι και οι πρώτες που ξεχνάω. Τι χρειάζονται; Μου φαίνονται τόσο εύκολες μερικές, που μου χάλασαν την εντύπωση:
όσο περισσότερο κυνηγάς να πιάσεις το μοιραίο λουλούδι της ευτυχίας, που τρέμει τόσο μπλε και όμορφο σε μια ρωγμή, τόσο πιο φριχτά καταλαβαίνεις, τόσο περισσότερο αντιλαμβάνεσαι το φρικαλέο και τρομερό χάσμα του γκρεμού κάτω σου, που αναπόφευκτα θα βουτήξεις μέσα του, σαν μέσα στην άβυσσο, αν προχωρήσεις λίγο περισσότερο. […] Αυτή είναι όλη η ιστορία για την αναζήτηση της ευτυχίας, ανεξάρτητα από το αν επιζητάς τη δική σου ευτυχία ή την ευτυχία ενός άλλου. […] Και οι γυναίκες; Ποιον άλλον σκοπό μπορεί να βάλει μια γυναίκα εκτός από την ευτυχία; Μόνο ευτυχία, για τον εαυτό της και για όλον τον κόσμο. Αυτό και τίποτε άλλο.
Τίποτε άλλο; Ε, καλά… Αυτό το παιχνίδι έμφυλων ρόλων, αρρενωπότητας και θηλυκότητας κ.τ.ό. μπορεί να ιντριγκάρει τον αναγνώστη μετά τον Μεγάλο Πόλεμο, που είχε και θέματα επαναφοράς στην κανονικότητα ενώ ο κόσμος είχε αμετάτρεπτα αλλάξει και όντως βρισκόταν ακόμη στο χάος. Και βλέπω ότι ακόμη και σήμερα έχει τη θέση του. Αφήνω που η “fox” (με τόσες συνδηλώσεις στην αγγλική…) είναι η χαρά των gender studies…
Πέρα όμως από το τέλος, ο Λώρενς πετυχαίνει να μπει κάπως στη θέση και των δύο γυναικών, ο αφηγητής ξεδιπλώνει ικανοποιητικά τον ψυχισμό τους όχι σαν κάποιο αρσενικό που απλώς παρατηρεί (και παρεξηγεί) εξωτερικές γυναικείες κινήσεις, που έτσι κι αλλιώς (τουλάχιστον τότε) υπαγορεύονταν από τους κοινωνικούς κώδικες. Κάποιες σελίδες σε παρασύρουν εντελώς σε μια κατανοούσα προοπτική, κι όλοι οι δισταγμοί και οι βεβαιότητες καίγονται καθώς ο νους κι η σάρκα φλέγονται (με τον τρόπο τους). Όμως, τελικά, δεν μένει τίποτε…
Αξίζει να διαβαστεί!
Γκρινιάρικη σημείωση για την έκδοση: η έκδοση που διάβασα είναι του 1991, η τρίτη –ανατύπωση όμως, όχι πραγματική νέα έκδοση. Το «Πλέθρον», προσεκτικό σε πολλά, αρκέστηκε να το γράψει αυτό μόνο στον κολοφώνα κι άφησε τη σελίδα τίτλου της δεύτερη έκδοσης του 1979. Κακώς! Δεν είναι πια και καμιά πολύτιμη παλαιά έκδοση που δεν θάθελε κάποιος να ‘χαλάσει’ τη σελίδα τίτλου. Επίσης, και αυτό το βλέπω και σε άλλες φωτογραφικές ανατυπώσεις (και πολύ πρόσφατες), η ποιότητα της εκτύπωσης ποικίλλει και αρκετές σελίδες είναι πιο αχνές. Τουλάχιστον απολαμβάνει κανείς το παλιό τυπογραφικό του «Πλέθρου».
Η εύθραστη Μαρτς (παρότι March, του αγρού και όχι του πολέμου) και η αρρενωπή (αλλά υπερευαίσθητη) Μπάνφορντ, κοντά στα τριάντα, συζούν σε ένα αγρόκτημα, ταπεινό και όχι ιδιαίτερα προσοδοφόρο, κάπου στην Αγγλία. «Είχαν ένα όμορφο σπίτι και θα έπρεπε να ήσαν ευτυχισμένες. Μόνο που μέσα τους ένιωθαν κάποια αηδία για τον τρόπο που ζούσαν, για την παράξενη επιμονή τους να μείνουν ανέραστες». Τα κουτσοκαταφέρνουν εκτρέφοντας κυρίως κότες. Τίποτε το τρομερό δεν ταράζει το αργό κύλισμα της ζωής μέσα στη φύση. Εκτός από κάτι: Ένας είναι ο εχθρός τους, εκτός από όλα τα άλλα, μια αλεπού, που –παρά τις προφυλάξεις– όλο και τα καταφέρνει και τρυπώνει και κάνει τη ζημιά. Και σκοπός τους να την εξολοθρεύσουν.
Κι όμως: όταν τα μαύρα μάτια της οπλισμένης Μαρτς καρφώνονται από τα μάτια της αλεπούς, ένιωσε μαγεμένη: «βαθιά μέσα της ήξερε ότι την γνώριζε […] ο τρόπος που την είχε κοιτάξει [η αλεπού] έμοιαζε να είχε κυριεύσει το μυαλό της. Αισθάνθηκε ότι το ζώο γινόταν ο κυρίαρχος του μυαλού της […] κυριαρχούσε στο υποσυνείδητό της». Ό,τι κι αν έκανε, «στο μυαλό της ερχόταν η γνωστή γοητεία της αλεπούς, εκείνη που την είχε τυλίξει όταν το ζώο την κοίταξε κατάματα. Ήταν σαν να το μύριζε εκείνες τις στιγμές. Και ερχόταν ξανά και ξανά, σε στιγμές που δεν το περίμενε, όπως όταν πήγαινε να κοιμηθεί το βράδυ, ή όταν έριχνε το νερό στην τσαγιέρα»….
Και σαν να μην έφτανε αυτή η αλεπού, ένα βράδυ, με σίγουρα βήματα και συρτή, μαλακή και χαμηλή φωνή εισβάλλει στο σπίτι ένας άντρας, κι η Μαρτς έμεινε να τον κοιτά γοητευμένη (ένα θέμα με τη γοητεία του απρόσμενου το είχε η κοπελιά). Είχε έρθει από αλλού, «από τη Θεσσαλονίκη» για την ακρίβεια (κι όμως!!! –από το μακεδονικό μέτωπο). Κι αρχίζει ένα γαϊτανάκι συναισθημάτων και συγκρούσεων ανάμεσα στις δυο γυναίκες και τον άντρα που τάραξε την ησυχία τους, με την Μαρτς το βράδυ να ονειρεύεται να την χαϊδεύει η φουντωτή ουρά της αλεπούς και το πρωί να βλέπει τον Χένρυ στο λιβάδι σαν αλεπού. «Δεν ήρθα να σου κλέψω τα κοτόπουλα», της ρίχνει παιχνιδιάρικα και την αποτελειώνει(;). Και πού τελειώνει το συμβολικό και πού το πραγματικό; (η χαρά της ψυχαναλυτικής κριτικής). Η συνέχεια επί του χάρτου (και επί του χόρτου;) είναι χορταστική :), όσο το επιτρέπει μια νουβέλα -αλλά εκτός αυτής της κριτικής.
Καθώς έχει τελειώσει η ιστορία (δεν έχει σημασία πώς), ο Λώρενς κρίνει σκόπιμο να αφιερώσει μερικές σελίδες με σκέψεις του αφηγητή για την ιστορία και την εξέλιξή της. Είναι οι τελευταίες που διαβάζονται και τις θυμάσαι ως πιο πρόσφατες, αλλά δεν θα πρέπει να μας παρεξηγήσει ο καλός μας συγγραφέας αν είναι και οι πρώτες που ξεχνάω. Τι χρειάζονται; Μου φαίνονται τόσο εύκολες μερικές, που μου χάλασαν την εντύπωση:
όσο περισσότερο κυνηγάς να πιάσεις το μοιραίο λουλούδι της ευτυχίας, που τρέμει τόσο μπλε και όμορφο σε μια ρωγμή, τόσο πιο φριχτά καταλαβαίνεις, τόσο περισσότερο αντιλαμβάνεσαι το φρικαλέο και τρομερό χάσμα του γκρεμού κάτω σου, που αναπόφευκτα θα βουτήξεις μέσα του, σαν μέσα στην άβυσσο, αν προχωρήσεις λίγο περισσότερο. […] Αυτή είναι όλη η ιστορία για την αναζήτηση της ευτυχίας, ανεξάρτητα από το αν επιζητάς τη δική σου ευτυχία ή την ευτυχία ενός άλλου. […] Και οι γυναίκες; Ποιον άλλον σκοπό μπορεί να βάλει μια γυναίκα εκτός από την ευτυχία; Μόνο ευτυχία, για τον εαυτό της και για όλον τον κόσμο. Αυτό και τίποτε άλλο.
Τίποτε άλλο; Ε, καλά… Αυτό το παιχνίδι έμφυλων ρόλων, αρρενωπότητας και θηλυκότητας κ.τ.ό. μπορεί να ιντριγκάρει τον αναγνώστη μετά τον Μεγάλο Πόλεμο, που είχε και θέματα επαναφοράς στην κανονικότητα ενώ ο κόσμος είχε αμετάτρεπτα αλλάξει και όντως βρισκόταν ακόμη στο χάος. Και βλέπω ότι ακόμη και σήμερα έχει τη θέση του. Αφήνω που η “fox” (με τόσες συνδηλώσεις στην αγγλική…) είναι η χαρά των gender studies…
Πέρα όμως από το τέλος, ο Λώρενς πετυχαίνει να μπει κάπως στη θέση και των δύο γυναικών, ο αφηγητής ξεδιπλώνει ικανοποιητικά τον ψυχισμό τους όχι σαν κάποιο αρσενικό που απλώς παρατηρεί (και παρεξηγεί) εξωτερικές γυναικείες κινήσεις, που έτσι κι αλλιώς (τουλάχιστον τότε) υπαγορεύονταν από τους κοινωνικούς κώδικες. Κάποιες σελίδες σε παρασύρουν εντελώς σε μια κατανοούσα προοπτική, κι όλοι οι δισταγμοί και οι βεβαιότητες καίγονται καθώς ο νους κι η σάρκα φλέγονται (με τον τρόπο τους). Όμως, τελικά, δεν μένει τίποτε…
Αξίζει να διαβαστεί!
Γκρινιάρικη σημείωση για την έκδοση: η έκδοση που διάβασα είναι του 1991, η τρίτη –ανατύπωση όμως, όχι πραγματική νέα έκδοση. Το «Πλέθρον», προσεκτικό σε πολλά, αρκέστηκε να το γράψει αυτό μόνο στον κολοφώνα κι άφησε τη σελίδα τίτλου της δεύτερη έκδοσης του 1979. Κακώς! Δεν είναι πια και καμιά πολύτιμη παλαιά έκδοση που δεν θάθελε κάποιος να ‘χαλάσει’ τη σελίδα τίτλου. Επίσης, και αυτό το βλέπω και σε άλλες φωτογραφικές ανατυπώσεις (και πολύ πρόσφατες), η ποιότητα της εκτύπωσης ποικίλλει και αρκετές σελίδες είναι πιο αχνές. Τουλάχιστον απολαμβάνει κανείς το παλιό τυπογραφικό του «Πλέθρου».
January 24, 2018
Ενδιαφέρουσα ιστορία από τον D. H. Lawrence, την οποία διάβασα μονορούφι και διασκέδασα πολύ!
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