A renowned Lawrence scholar portrays the writer as a man whose genius sprang from his deep sense of alienation from his family, his peers, his lovers, and his physical self

Quoting extensively from rarely seen letters, and drawing on a wealth of original research, John Worthen tells the story of D.H. Lawrence from the most intimate perspective yet.

Lawrence lived his life in a constant battle against convention. He struggled against it throughout his awkward and intense youth in an impoverished coal-mining town, in his fraught relationships with women and men, through the years of exile during which he produced his most vital and provocative writing, right up to his premature death from tuberculosis at the age of forty-four.

This seductive and deeply engaging biography offers a bold reappraisal of a man who was horribly uncomfortable in his own skin. Lawrence's fascination with the body and his determination to articulate its every experience brought about his notorious reputation, and ultimately, his literary redemption. What emerges in Worthen's portrait is an intimate and absolutely compelling study of an individual in angry revolt against his class, culture, and country, a man engaged in a passionate struggle to live in accordance with his beliefs.

With Worthen as expert guide, we follow the unbroken thread of Lawrence's furious commitment to his writing, as he created some of the most ambitious and influential novels of the twentieth century.