Analyse
Paul’s relation with the three women in his life/
Analyse
the Character of Paul.
Paul Morel is the main
character in DH Lawrence’s novel Sons and Lovers . The story charts his
early life from when his parents married and the subsequent birth of four
children, through childhood and early adulthood to the death of his mother. During
this time three women have a major impact on his life, his mother, Miriam and
Clara. Each has the most influence at different times in his life and can be
attributed to his childhood, being a young man and early adulthood
respectively; but each woman s influence carries on to shape Paul into the man
he becomes.
Gertrude is the most powerful
woman in Paul’s life, and thus this tight-knit relationship serves as the root
for Paul’s future affairs. It is no
coincidence that Gertrude shares the same name as Hamlet’s Queen Gertrude, for
both women share the mother’s possessive role of the Oedipal complex. Paul sees his mother as youthful and
virginal, frequently comparing her to flowers.
At times Paul and Gertrude’s closeness is almost like that of a couple,
for example while the mother and son dine in town together, Paul thinks of her
as "gay as a sweetheart", and feels the "excitement of
lovers". However, Gertrude’s youthfulness
was not eternal, and so when it begins to fade, Paul experiences both
irritation and jealousy:
Why can’t a man have a young
mother? … And why wasn’t I the oldest son?
Look—they say the young ones
have the advantage—but look, they had the
young mother. You should have had me for your eldest son.
