Lady Chatterley’s Lover: Metaphors 11 key examples

When he says that "[s]omething inside him perished," Lawrence is pointing out the psychological damage that traumatic wartime injuries can do to veterans like Clifford. It is not just that the nerves in his legs and back have “perished,” preventing him from moving. His personality has suffered a debilitating injury, too. While the “anxious brightness” of Clifford’s eyes suggests his relief at being alive, the underlying blankness suggests that it is only for show. Clifford is not proud of living, but rather of having survived the "great shock" of his accident. His survival has come at a high price, especially given that he can no longer father a child and continue his family’s line.

The physical injuries Lord Chatterley sustained are only part of a deadly emotional and psychological wound. The war has numbed him, creating an internal void where his personality used to be. Lawrence expands on this through his description of the "blank of insentience” within Clifford. "Insentience" means "being incapable of feeling things." Clifford isn’t just hurt, he has partially “perished.”

Lawrence uses the words “lovemaking” and “connexion” here as euphemisms for sexual relations. The phrase "gift of themselves" alludes to virginity. In referring to virginity as a "gift," Lawrence is provocatively emphasizing a traditional view of female purity. At this time, virginity was still regarded as a woman’s most valuable asset, something to be preserved and only “given” in exchange for marriage. It is an asset that the girls own, but that society doesn’t believe they have the right to spend.

However, the narrator suggests in this passage that the actual value and significance of sex might be misunderstood. The “gift” of virginity is reimagined here as a true “gift” that should be given voluntarily. When a gift is given and something is expected in return, it’s not a gift but a trade. Sex without marriage, then, is a real “gift,” a way of expressing affection without reciprocity. When he asks if a girl can be “queenly” and give this “gift,” Lawrence implies that a woman "giving herself" can be a magnanimous, generous act.

Moreover, the passage also points to the idea that sex itself isn’t actually the point of these interactions. By presenting the act of “connexion” as "only a sort of primitive reversion and a bit of an anti-climax," Lawrence challenges conventional 19th-century perceptions of sex’s value. He’s overtly stating here that it’s the “subtle and intimate arguments” that Hilda and Connie have that are actually the “great thing.” Compared to these, sex seems like an “anti-climax.” This is also wordplay, as it’s implied repeatedly that neither sister actually ever orgasms from these “connexions.” The “climax” of their pleasure in these relationships is not a sexual one, but an intellectual one.

Dukes employs the metaphor of a "plucked apple" to explain the consequences of not being in tune with one’s physical urges. People who “live their life,” to Dukes, are people who maintain an “organic connexion” between their bodies and the world. He argues that the consequences of an over-reliance on the "mental life" must be that a person is severed from the “tree” of organic connection to the world. Doing so, according to him, makes deterioration unavoidable. Dukes believes that, just as an apple can do nothing but over-ripen and rot once it has been “plucked” from the tree, individuals who disconnect from their physicality are doomed to become "spiteful."

Dukes is speaking in absolute contradiction to Clifford’s previous point, here. While Clifford believes that prioritizing the intellect and disregarding the body is the most moral and noble of choices, Dukes disagrees fundamentally. The strong verb “plucked” points to this, as “plucking” an apple is a measured, deliberate act. Anyone who chooses to “pluck” themselves from the tree of bodily experience, Dukes states, will by “natural necessity” become a bad apple.

As Connie tries to understand Clifford’s new coldness, she comes to realize one of the “great laws” of the “human soul.” In this quotation, Lawrence explores the disconnect between physical wholeness and psychological healing. Clifford looks as if he has mentally recovered from his injury, and his body has healed as much as it can. Because of this, his outward attitude follows suit, but as Lawrence says, “this is only the mechanism of the re-assumed habit.” This quotation asserts that the healing of the “soul” is much more complex and evasive than that of the body. Even if a person seems fully recovered, they might discover that the trauma they have experienced “makes itself felt like a bruise,” appearing deep from under their skin and aching. Beneath Clifford’s “chirpy” facade, his emotional wounds gape and fester, numbing him to love and pleasure.

A sea anemone is a soft, delicate little marine creature that opens and closes its one orifice in response to its environment. It is sightless, speechless, and immobile, only able to react to things that happen to it instead of taking action. This metaphor mirrors Connie's unexpected response to sex with Mellors. The idea of the sea anemone’s “mouth clamoring” ultimately echoes the silent dilation and closing of both an anemone's cavity underwater and a human vagina as it is penetrated. Lawrence goes further than this, saying that it’s not just her vagina that desires Mellors’s presence, but that her “womb” is “open and soft” in response to his penetration. While Connie had previously understood sex to be a way for her to reclaim power, with Mellors she is suddenly and involuntarily pushed into submission. Her internal organs are acting on their on accord.

This passage’s imagery evokes a sense of profound vulnerability. The texture of a sea anemone’s flesh is very much like the mucous membranes of a human vulva, and the reader gets a vivid picture of the yearning pinkish “mouth” opening and closing in this scene. The “tide” that Lawrence describes also evokes the image of repeating movements back and forth, like those Connie and Mellors are making during intercourse. Connie is swept up in a tide of sensations, unable to regain self-control as she “clamors” for fulfillment in an unfamiliar way.

Lawrence’s language in this passage illustrates a profound connection between Connie and her surroundings. This is a stark departure from her previous discontentment and loss of “connexion” with nature. Connie is surrounded by flowers waiting to bloom and burst. Instead of feeling distant from them, though, she feels aligned with their "silent effort." The metaphor of sap rising through the trees in spring also suggests that there’s a direct interplay between the external world’s changing seasons, and the sexual thaw Mellors has started in Connie.

Describing the spring rush of sap into the forest, Lawrence details the process of "the huge heave of the sap in the massive trees, upwards, up, up to the bud-tips, there to push into little flamey oak-leaves, bronze as blood." This complex sentence evokes a sense of powerful, irrepressible energy that mirrors Connie’s own sexual awakening. The sentence’s repetition and short, punchy diction make it feel as if it is itself “rushing.” The oak-leaves, about to open, are as "flamey" and "bronze as blood." This evokes the idea of blood rushing through the body, coloring the leaves like Connie’s blushes of excitement and arousal.

In the simile that follows, Lawrence likens the sap to "a ride running turgid upward, and spreading on the sky." This further emphasizes the idea that Connie and the world are both experiencing intense renewal and excitement. The choice of the word "turgid" here is important. When something is “turgid” it is engorged with liquid. It’s a term that is often associated with an erect penis. Here, the trees themselves seem to be “erect” to Connie, and the sap that thumps through them is about to burst through, “spreading on the sky” like ejaculating semen. Everything, including the end of winter and the return of life to the “hazel copse” has taken on an exciting, erotic tinge for Lady Chatterley.

The idea of a "new" England overshadowing the old points to the tension between progress and preservation. Connie feels mournful about the inevitability of the industrial changes her own husband is helping to achieve.

When something is “blotted out,” it means that it is covered up or obscured by something darker. Like ink dropping onto a page, Connie believes the “mines” will cover up all traces of “the agricultural England.” The metaphor literally evokes the choking black smoke of the mining industry, as well as its power to replace rural ways of life. Through this metaphor of one England “blotting out” another, Lawrence critiques the relentless march of industrialization. While bringing wealth and advancement to the “halls” of the wealthy, Connie feels that increased industrial presence will also erase the beauty of the countryside and that “history” will blot out the “halls” just like the cottages.

Mellors is having both an emotional and a sexual reaction to Constance's body in this scene. As he's complimenting her, his voice catches in his throat. Lawrence emphasizes the "caressive" qualities of Midlands English when he describes Mellors's speech here. When Mellors has a hold on himself, his English can be almost as standard and formal as Constance's or Clifford's. When he's overcome with a feeling, however, he reverts to a more heightened version of regional diction. This stronger accent is accompanied by several regional idioms that give the reader a sense of local color and increase the realism of the scene. Mellors isn't quoting Shakespeare to woo Constance. He's speaking plainly and honestly, especially when he uses idioms like “sure as nuts.”

This idiom refers to the stores of nuts and acorns that squirrels make to sustain themselves in the winter. When he says that Connie's bottom is "ivery bit" womanly "as sure as nuts," he's pointing out the obviousness of its size and "globe-fulness." It's "womanly" to him because it's not a small "button" bottom, but a "soft and sloping" one. He's also implying that Connie has a good store of "arse" squirreled away for coming times. It's so big and fine, he goes on to say, that it could "hold up the world." By this, he means to praise its strength, but he also means that it's an excellent example of a nice "woman's arse."

The metaphor Lawrence uses here—Connie being "pierced" during her sexual experiences—serves to illustrate the profound impact that her emotional connection with Mellors provokes. Their connection is “different, sharper, more terrible” than mere pleasure, making her feel vulnerable. All of the references to “piercing” here refer to the act of penetrative sex, where Mellors “pierces” her vagina with his penis. However, Mellors is also symbolically “piercing” her personality, which feels transformative. Connie’s sense of self is being penetrated and altered as her body is. Sex here isn’t just burning or “piercing” but functions like a force of nature. When the author describes Connie as being shaken to her "foundations," he likens her to a structure enduring an earthquake or a bombing. The “reckless, senseless” intensity of their sex leaves her no room to hide. She’s exposed.  

The simile in this passage makes another comparison of Connie and Mellors’s relationship to "fire." While this “fire” often references their fragile, forbidden bond—a flame they must nurture—here it’s a destructive, cleansing force. Sex with Mellors puts Connie in a crucible, where she’s reduced to her most basic elements. This encounter "burns" away her inhibitions and shame, leaving her stripped down, purified, and renewed.

When he describes shame, Lawrence depicts it as an animal living inside Connie's body and psyche. During her relationship with Mellors, Connie has come to understand much more about her sexual self and intellectual capacity. She previously held deep-seated fears and anxieties about her worthiness and personhood, but Mellors “rouses” and “routs” her shame. He does this through the “sensual fire” of their physical relationship. Lawrence uses metaphors comparing fire to passion several times in Lady Chatterley’s Lover. As elsewhere, their "fire" refers to the heat and energy Mellors and Connie generate together. 

The second metaphor in this passage points to the complexity of human sexuality. Connie has spent much of the novel working through the enormous changes in her expectations, ambitions, and preconceptions since taking up with Mellors. When she has this moment of clarity during sex with him, she comes to the “heart of the jungle” of herself. She has fought through all the complexities of her marital and social life to realize how she understands masculinity and femininity. When she reaches her own "heart," she has overcome "shame" and "fear."

The scene this passage sets is very dark and primal, especially when Connie comes to “the heart of herself.” The author's language is full of sexual references. The “phallic hunt” Lawrence describes equates Mellors’s erect penis to the spears ancient hunters carried. The “tangled jungle” here also refers to Connie's pubic hair and equates the “phallic hunt” reaching her “heart” to penetrative sex. As often happens in this novel, a mental change is represented by describing a sexual act.

In this letter, Mellors describes his concerns that the future of England, its class system, and its colonies is going to be very bad. He describes this fear as “turning his insides to water.” He isn’t actually being liquified: this metaphor refers to the stomach-turning effects of terror. Rather than being firmly filled with solid organs, his fear makes him feel full of “water” when he thinks of the future. The metaphor also expresses his kinship with Connie, who is pregnant with his child. He realizes that she must also be scared. He sees her as newly vulnerable due to her pregnancy. Mellors might be anxious, but some of Connie’s insides have literally turned to water as she grows her child inside her and waits for the uncertain future to come.

Mellors isn’t hopeless, however. The second metaphor in this passage suggests that he believes people will always be resilient in the face of hardship and struggle. Even though there have been lots of “bad times,” he writes, those trials haven’t been able to “blow the crocus out.” Crocuses are purple flowers that burst out of the ground everywhere in the English springtime. They have bright orange stamens, which are often compared to flames. When Mellors says that the “bad times” haven’t blown “the crocus” out, he means that people have always kept going through adversity. Even if things are complex, the “flames” of the crocuses always return. They won't be "blown out" by the "death and destruction" he sees coming.