Book Review: "Tenderness" by Alison MacLeod

I have read some pretty good books about the impact other pieces of literature have on the world and some of these include the legendary “Reading Lolita in Tehran” by Azir Nafisi all the way down to Peter Ackroyd’s biography of William Shakespeare. The one thing I have always been surprised about is the constant way in which the authors reinvent the purpose of the writer’s life and works by establishing it in a different context. For example: the banned book “Lolita” has one context, but attempting to read it in Tehran has a whole different meaning altogether. Alison MacLeod attempts to do the same for the latter works of D.H Lawrence in her seminal work: “Tenderness”. A book about the exile of an author, she attempts to piece together the character of D.H Lawrence on his way out of life whilst also showing the impact his magnum opus and downfall: “Lady Chatterley’s Lover” had on the growing world. Especially looking at different times and places, this book is basically a testament not just to Lawrence’s own work but to the very nature of banned books themselves, showing that when literature becomes contraband, it just becomes more widely read amongst the public who wonder exactly what it could possibly do to us. When it came to “Lady Chatterley’s Lover” - well let’s just say there are still places where it is not entirely acceptable to be seen reading it, probably not banned but not socially accepted.

Alison Macleod starts by going through the dynamics of the relationship of DH Lawrence and Frida, his love. The relationship is a facade as much as we know. They produce happy smiles and ‘tenderness’ when they are around others but left alone, they are unhappy and awkward with each other as the romance has disappeared from their relationship. Lawrence is trying to find a way to live his life the way he wants to again, stuck in what he thinks is a rut he brought on himself he is filled with self-doubt, shame and grief as he travels around looking for another place to call home. Apart from the book “Burning Man” by Frances Wilson, this has got to be one of the best books I have read about DH Lawrence ever. It is written as if we are really getting inside his head and my god, what a place it is to be. Pity fights depression in his inability to understand why he cannot keep friends long and where he must go next.

Move on to the second volume to which the first volume alternates and, though I won’t say a lot to avoid spoilers, we see the first lady of the United States of America, Jacqueline Kennedy interested in “Lady Chatterley’s Lover”. Worried about being married to a Kennedy, she notices her relationship growing strange - she cares for her husband but cannot seem to be herself or even find herself anymore. Scared to death that he may die of his illnesses, there is a scene were she prays almost vividly with her head bowed for him to be alright. The scene I enjoyed the most from this section though has to be the one where she is talking to a literary critic and author about the book and at the end, she reads a passage from it. It is written so beautifully that you can actually hear Jackie Kennedy’s voice inside your head whilst she is reciting this paragraph from the Lawrence novel.

A brilliant insight which includes all this and a lot more, this book is a work that will pound upon your heart and, as Elif Shafak put, conquer it. A passionate love letter to one of the most controversial novels of the 20th century, it takes apart the author and the work bit by bit. And finally, it makes them travel through time long after the writer’s own death.