D. H. Lawrence Quotes

1885–1930 England

David Herbert Lawrence (11 September 1885 – 2 March 1930) was an English novelist, poet, playwright, essayist, literary critic and painter who published as D. H.

England
Essayists
Novelists
Painters
Playwrights

Also known as: D.H. Lawrence

Random D. H. Lawrence quote

56 quotes

My God, these folks don't know how to love — that's why they love so easily.

When I read Shakespeare I am struck with wonder
that such trivial people should muse and thunder
in such lovely language.

Pansies (1929)

Quem Deus vult perdere. All the time when I look at my countrymen, my mind exclaims in amazement "Whom Jupiter wishes to destroy, he first sends mad".

It's the man who dares to take, who is independent, not he who gives.

The world is supposed to be full of possibilities, but they narrow down to pretty few in most personal experience.

Lady Chatterley's Lover (1928)

The tiny fish enjoy themselves
in the sea.
Quick little splinters of life,
their little lives are fun to them
in the sea.

Little Fish (1929)

I hold that the parentheses are by far the most important parts of a non-business letter.

Tragedy ought really to be a great kick at misery.

I can't stand Willy wet-leg,
can't stand him at any price.
He's resigned, and when you hit him
he lets you hit him twice.

Willy Wet Leg (1929)

Is it the secret of the long-nosed Etruscans?
The long-nosed, sensitive-footed, subtly-smiling Etruscans
Who made so little noise outside the cypress groves?

"Each forgot everything save the hatred of the other."

Sons and Lovers (1913)

"To be rid of our individuality, which is our will, which is our effort⎯⎯⎯to live effortless, a kind of curious sleep⎯⎯⎯that is very beautiful, I think; that is our after-life⎯⎯⎯our immortality."

Sons and Lovers (1913)

Mystic equality lies in abstraction, not in having or in doing, which are processes. In function and process, one man, one part, must of necessity be subordinate to another. It is a condition of being.

Women in Love (1920)

Folks should do their own fuckin', then they wouldn't want to listen to a lot of clatfart about another man's.

Lady Chatterley's Lover (1928)

We have to hate our immediate predecessors to get free from their authority.

Money poisons you when you've got it, and starves you when you haven't.

Lady Chatterley's Lover (1928)

Never trust the artist. Trust the tale. The proper function of a critic is to save the tale from the artist who created it

Studies in Classic American Literature (1923)

The dead don't die. They look on and help.

Marriage is the clue to human life, but there is no marriage apart from the wheeling sun and the nodding earth, from the straying of the planets and the magnificance of the fixed stars.

A Propos of Lady Chatterley's Lover (1929)

California is a queer place — in a way, it has turned its back on the world, and looks into the void Pacific. It is absolutely selfish, very empty, but not false, and at least, not full of false effort.

Attribution

Quotes and notes from Wikiquote: D. H. Lawrence (page history), available under CC BY-SA 4.0.