Fyne Times Gay and Lesbian Magazine, UK

DH Lawrence

Birth: 11th September, 1885
Place of Birth: Eastwood, Nottinghamshire, Britain
Nationality: British
Job Title: Teacher, Writer,
Partners: Louie Burrows, Alex Dax, Frieda Weekly, William Henry Hocking, Other Male Name Unknown
Died: 2nd March, 1930, Vence, France

Discontentment is an emotion that has linked all of the Gay Greats we have featured so far. Despite high success in their chosen field, all have seemed to be on a quest to find something, a state of mind, a sense of peace, a pure love. For this month’s Gay Great, the quest to find his personal utopia took him from a small town to a huge array of countries, always with the desire to find that one place he could call home.

David Herbert Richards Lawrence was born on the 11th September 1885 in a rural Nottinghamshire town called Eastwood. His father, Arthur John Lawrence, was a hard working miner working in one of the many deep pits that dotted the town. His wife, Lydia, came from a vastly more affluent background and had worked as a schoolmistress before settling down to have a family. Seldom did the couple see eye to eye.

In his first few weeks, Lawrence was struck by a severe bout of bronchitis. Although he somehow survived, the illness left his lungs badly damaged. As a child, Lawrence was unable to play like other children. When he began to attend Beauvale Board School at the age of 7, his medical condition set him even further apart. His academic work did not over compensate either and Lawrence remained a definitely average pupil. To his teachers, it looked as though he was swiftly heading nowhere.

However, as Lawrence grew, he slowly learned that academia was one area in which his physical limitations were unimportant. By the time he was ready to be considered for entry into a prep school, Lawrence had achieved enough to become the first pupil ever from Beauvale to win a scholarship to Nottingham High School. The scholarship was not a full bursary and the financial strain on the family was massive. Nevertheless, they chose to muddle through. In return, the young scholar put a huge amount of effort into his schoolwork, often working a 7am – 7pm day.

At 15, he left school and moved onto his first job as a clerk in a local factory. But the refined Lawrence did not fit in. After only three months of work, the combination of a poor working environment and the stress of the job brought on a bad case of pneumonia. Lawrence spent a lot of time convalescing at a local farm where, at last, he made a friend. Haggs Farm was owned by the Chambers family and Lawrence soon became friends with Jessie Chambers. They often swapped books and would spend hours on the farm discussing what they had read.

Despite their closeness, Chambers and Lawrence never became lovers. Later, Lawrence hinted that around the time he was convalescing at Haggs Farm, he was also conducting an affair with a local miner, his first sexual liaison. Although he never expanded upon these comments, few people who knew him at the time would have deemed a homosexual affair ‘out of character’. Lawrence was feminine and poetic in nature, as far removed from the rough and tough male world as he could possibly be.

By 1902, his health had improved enough for him to consider working again. Lawrence decided to start teaching. After a short spell at a local primary school as an assistant, he decided to become a fully qualified teacher. He chose to study locally and took up a place at the newly opened Teacher Training Department at the University College, Nottingham. Lawrence thrived on being back in an academic environment. During the day he attended lessons and tutorials while at night, under the guise of ‘home study’, he began to write. Starting with some poetry and modest short stories, he worked on developing a style apart from any of the authors he and Chambers had studied. He even started work on his first novel. His first published piece came in 1907 when, under the pen name of Jessie Chambers, he won a writing competition in a local paper.

When his teacher training was complete, Lawrence moved to Croydon to take up his first full time teaching position. Soon after, his first novel was ready for publication. The White Peacock appeared on bookseller’s shelves in 1911 and was received with mild acclaim. His career as a writer seemed on the up. However, the joy of his success was overshadowed by the death of his mother. Lawrence, who had always held his mother in the greatest of affection, was devastated. The few months that followed would later be termed by Lawrence as his ‘sick year’. He fell into a deep depression and before long the stress had brought about another pneumonic infection. Lawrence was forced, once again, to give up work and recuperate.

During his ‘sick year’, Lawrence had his first few sexual explorations with women. First was a failed love affair with Alex Dax, a married suffragist and later an engagement to a local Eastwood girl, Louie Burrows. Both affairs came to nothing and through the increasing amount of homoeroticism in his writing, it is clear to see his fascination with male-to-male attraction was still alive and well.

Noticing the dead end in his career, one of Lawrence’s old tutors invited his young protégé to dinner. A German man by birth, he wished to help Lawrence get a teaching post in his homeland. Lawrence’s attention was instead stolen by his tutor’s beautiful and strong willed wife Frieda and the two began a torrid affair. After a short time, they decided to run away together and headed directly for Germany.

The couple found it hard to settle in Frieda’s country of birth and after a while, they took a long hike over the Alps to Italy. There, Lawrence worked hard on his next novel, a heavily autobiographical work called Sons and Lovers. The novel was published in 1913 and solidified Lawrence’s name as a respected writer. Now married, Lawrence and Frieda stayed in Italy for as long as the growing tensions in mainland Europe would allow. By 1914 however, it was clear that conflict was inevitable and they headed for the safety of England.

When they arrived, Lawrence was told, predictably, that his health was not up to service in the army. The medical also brought to light the fact that he was suffering not just from bad lungs, but also tuberculosis. Lawrence refused to accept this diagnosis and sought no treatment for it. Instead, the couple moved to a quiet cottage in Cornwall overlooking the sea. Their intention was to ride out the war in a haven of peace and turn their back on the world. But this dream was never to be realised. Locals soon began to look with suspicion towards the cottage on the coast. Not only was Frieda a German living in wartime England, word got around that she was also the cousin of ace fighter pilot Baron von Richthofen, also known as ‘The Red Baron’. Inevitably, they became the subject of witch hunts and finger pointing. The police were never far from their door and their every move was scrupulously noted by the authorities and locals alike.

Their peace was also shattered by the failings of their marriage. Lawrence harboured an unfulfilled desire for one of their close friends who briefly took the cottage next door. His desire for a closer affection rejected, Lawrence found comfort with a local farmer. Lawrence’s letters confess their relationship contained a highly sexual element. The effect on his marriage was stormy and often violent.

In his career, things weren’t much better. His latest novel, The Rainbow, became the subject of an obscenity trial a month after its release. As well as being a highly sexually charged work, The Rainbow also alluded to a lesbian relationship and played with male same-sex desire. Lawrence lost the trial and although he gained some much needed publicity, every issue of the book was seized and burnt. Lawrence’s reply was to write a sequel, entitled Women in Love. Although it was less aggressively sexual than the original, it famously contains the description of two men wrestling in the nude.

The Cornish persecution of the Lawrence couple came to a head in 1918 when one of the police searches the couple regularly endured turned up a set of powerful lights. As submarines had been spotted off the coast quite near to their cottage, it was concluded that they must have been using the lights to signal to the enemy. The Defence of the Realm Act, which sought to order the public for the good of the war effort, was used to have them expelled from Cornwall. Once again, the couple set out to find their utopia elsewhere.

Their search took them briefly to Berkshire before they left British shores forever in self imposed exile. Over the next few years, they travelled to Australia, Italy, France and Ceylon, all the while searching for somewhere to settle. Lawrence continued to write and publish at a fierce rate. His works included several accounts of the places he had been and the things he had seen, all in his characteristic vivid style.

While in Italy, where they had been for some time, the couple received a letter from notorious millionaire and patron of the arts Mabel Dodge Luhan. She wanted Lawrence to visit her mountain home in New Mexico to put into words the beauty of the surrounding countryside. Needless to say, the couple fell in love with the area and decided to take a house of their own, several thousand feet above sea level on the side of Taos mountain. Still living in denial of his tuberculosis, Lawrence spent his days under his favourite tree endlessly writing. He turned his pen to many subjects; critical essays, psychology, theology and many more subjects. Anything that captured his attention became fodder for his writing talents.

But once again, the couple began to feel unsettled. After only a few years in New Mexico, they started travelling again. However, their new voyage of exploration was to be cut short. Lawrence, already in poor health, contracted Malaria. They returned to Italy to set up home in the north of the country to help his recovery. By 1930, his condition deteriorated due to his worsening tuberculosis, and he had no choice but to be admitted to a local hospital. They could do little for a man with poor lungs and tuberculosis. He was released and settled briefly into a villa in Vence, France, purchased by Frieda for the sole purpose of being Lawrence’s personal hospice. He passed away on 2nd March 1930.

Lawrence’s search for utopia spawned some great and vivid works that transported readers to far-flung places they would never have a hope of seeing for themselves. Yet for all his travelling, he never found that special place to call home. Maybe the combination of the right weather, house or countryside was wrong in every location. Maybe it was simply that Lawrence’s utopia was a place he had only ever visited in his works, a place where he could freely express his desire for men and live a life of sexual freedom away from the restrictions of society. Sadly for Lawrence, society had a long road to travel before his utopia could ever become a reality.