The Rainbow by D.H. LawrenceMy rating: 1 of 5 stars
Disclosure:
I come across this Novel while I was exploring the page of D.H. Lawrence, I thought it would be amazing to explore the style of this writer but the result was that I am disappointed.
My Plot:
First the story begin with the description of the Place, Brangwen Farm where most of the events have happened, the writer say that the farm has been isolated from the main village due to roads and rail ways that was build during the industrialization of the region. The focus began with the family of Brangwen in General, than the focus turns back to be on Tom Brangwen the noisy and lazy boy, after the death of the main family members, Tom leads an unsuitable life, according to the writer, he was looking for love; with someone who wants to share with him this feeling. Now the focus begin on Tom Brangwen and Lydia Lensky; the Polish refugee who came to the village with her daughter Anna. Tom Brangwen get married with Lydia and took Anna as his step daughter. After the long run, Anna grow older, and begin to explore her womanhood. Than the focus changed to Anna Brangwen and William Brangwen, both couple leads a happy life in the House near the Church, Anna gave birth to Ursula and Gudrun, through all the chapter after Ursula's birth, the Writer was coming back and passing by the narration times, to mention the death of Tom Brangwen the Father in the flood, and to mention the Death of Lydia Brangwen after several years from her husband's death. and after that, came the focus to Ursula Brangwen and her love affair with Anton Skrebensky, the writer in this moment combines between the love affair and the teaching experience that Ursula has been experimenting in Saint Philip elementary school, the end was somehow tragic, Ursula break up her relation with Anton, the latter get married to a colonel daughter and sailed to India to live a happy life. Ursula stayed in England suffering from her weak dependency of herself. Lawrence finish the story by saying that Ursula have seen a Rainbow which symbolize that life is still going on, even with the gloom that Industry has made inside her.
Positive and Negative Aspects:
Let get the positive aspects first, The Rainbow was an exploration of the physical and psychological aspects of all its characters, actually I wasn't fond of this style that D.H. Lawrence have tried, but I see it not my burden to criticize his methods in writing. Passing now to Negative aspects, I would say that D.H. Lawrence was so much heavy in depicting the natural sides of life inside England including Forests, Rivers and all that follows. Besides, his psychological depiction of the Characters' feelings was not successful. The fact is that I was annoyed to keep reading deep description of Characters. Lawrence was trying to implement the Technique of Psychological Depiction that was lead by Dostoevsky, but the result was that he didn't make the readers enjoying; rather he keep annoying them. And that's the reason I vote with just one Star over Five.
My Personal Reaction:
I guess that this is the first time I admit something I didn't like, Reading for two weeks continuously the life and the Death of the Brangwen family without stating something special, for me it was a waste of time, that person was criticizing the Industrialization of his country with the help of his Characters, and I was like a dog with a red nose discovering his thoughts. Generally I didn't enjoy reading this heavy serial of the Brangwen Family. as you see, I am planning to read the sequel of his work, and I hope to find that "Women in Love" is something more interesting than "the Rainbow".
Recommendations:
First of all you need to have a dictionary with you each time you read a chapter from this book, because you may encounter several new words that Mr. Lawrence used in his work, the fact is that he was trying to show up that he is able to explore Language from all its aspects.
Second, the Rainbow is full of sexual description of Characters, than I do not recommend to audience under the age of 18. Third note is that I recommend none native speakers of English to spot all the villages inside the Rainbow, because I am sure they will get confused.
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