D. H. Lawrence's Lady Chatterley's Lover is one of the best-known and most resonant works of the twentieth century. Originally considered obscene and unpublishable in numerous countries, its scandalous story of class divide and the English countryside is infamous. Guy Cuthbertson tells the story of the novel's journey through the last hundred years.
His main claim is persuasive: Lady Chatterley is everywhere. Professor Cuthbertson (he teaches at Liverpool Hope University) is a great Lady Chatterley search engine, and he has scraped up a staggering number of 'Chatterley' hits ... The over-all impression left by Cuthbertson’s book is that, after being liberated from the censors, Lady Chatterley went very quickly from being a scandal to being a joke ... It’s famous, but in the way Mickey Mouse is famous.
Shows us just how long it took to metabolize Lawrence’s 'fetid masterpiece.' If you need a Chatterley refresher, or if you’ve never had the pleasure, you should know about Lady Constance ... He’s also tallied other writers’ opinions on Chatterley.
Guy Cuthbertson has been a diligent researcher, spending many hours trawling through archives and cuttings. He has even looked through the trial judge’s copy of the book, with its highlighting of rude words. If he underplays the significance of Kate Millett’s attack on the novel’s phallocentrism, that’s because he’s keeping things light. After all the heavy moralising that went with the book, it’s the right way to go. He has produced an enjoyable piece of social history, less earnest Leavisite sermonising than saucy Ealing Studios comedy.
