Pair’s ‘orgy of reading’ opened up a new world

LIBRARIES are under threat again, in Nottingham, as elsewhere. D.H. Lawrence, his family and friends, valued their Mechanics Institute lending library (Mansfield Road, Eastwood) immensely, though open merely two hours each week, 7-9pm Thursdays.

Lawrence’s father “hated books, hated the sight of anyone reading or writing,” Lawrence records. His sister Ada recalls their mother “loved to read,” fetching “piles of books... to be enjoyed when we were all in bed”.

Lawrence’s devoted friend, Jessie Chambers of Haggs Farm, remembers regular trips to choose books, for themselves and their families, becoming “the outstanding event of the week.” (Mr Chambers’ “milkcart” carried books back and forth, three miles, also!) The “book-hunt” thrilled them both.

Familiar with the stock, Lawrence eagerly made most choices. Jessie’s list in hand, he’d “pounce”, selecting something to suit all tastes. An elderly librarian allowed them more loans than rules permitted.

In these pre-”phono Sapiens” times, the teenage pair walked to The Haggs “literally burdened with books”, vividly reliving recent literary adventures. Jessie’s brother David remembers the “liveliest discussions” ever. “Lawrence invested books with the attribute of something alive.”

This “orgy of reading” introduced “a new world, a widening and enlargement of life,” Jessie writes. They identified with characters and their experiences, in Little Women, Lorna Doone, works by Longfellow,

Stevenson, Tennyson, Dickens, George Eliot, Elizabeth Gaskell, the Brontës, etc. The “scenes and events” of Sir Walter Scott’s stories became “more real to us than our actual surroundings.” Lawrence “began to talk definitely of writing.”

In The Times this month, author Alice O’keeffe affirms Lawrence’s success, saying she “can’t think of a wiser or more beautiful book than Sons and Lovers.”

100 YEARS AGO, Feb 23rd 1924, Lawrence advises Koteliansky they’ll “arrive Victoria from Dover at 5.10 on Tuesday afternoon.” Will stay at Garlands hotel, “near National Gallery.” Lawrence sends his “Dearest Little Mother” impressions of Paris. People, wagons along the boulevard, “in the morning sun.” Versailles, “frightfully large,” like a “puffed-up frog” that “goes Pop!” Similarly, “Roi Soleil.” The “Petit Trianon of Marie Antoinette,” a “dolls palace,” disappointed Frieda. Frieda’s bought two hats, “and is proud.” Also “three very lovely blouses.” Tomorrow, it’s Chartres cathedral. “So, Schwiegermutter,” you “travel beside us and with us,” despite “age.” Letters, and postcards of Chateau de Malmaison, outlining arrangements, mention people skating on the Grand Canal.

29th, informs Mabel Dodge Luhan they’ll “sail on Wednesday 5th March, on the Aquitania,” arriving “New York by 12th March.” Lawrence looks “forward to Taos again, to space and distance, and not all these people. Greet Tony - Frieda sends her excited greetings.”

The teenage pair walked to The Haggs “literally burdened with books”, vividly reliving recent literary adventures