Culture Crisis: A Critical Study of D. H. Lawrence’s Women in Love

Abstract

The concept of Culture Crisis refers to when a culture is unable to fully utilize its potential due to the presence of excessive misery, injustice, and conflict. This paper explores and analyzes the culture crisis depicted in the novel Women in Love by D.H. Lawrence (1920). It covers various relevant issues, including cultural change, the relationship between culture and civilization, socio-economic change and its impact on culture crisis, the theoretical foundations of culture, and emotional bankruptcy. Through a discussion and analysis of the perspectives put forth by Rader (1947), Bidney (1946), and Sveiceris (1989), the paper reveals significant cultural crises at the socio-economic, interpersonal, spiritual, and emotional levels. The findings of this study attribute the causes and complexities of culture crisis to factors such as a lack of underlying ideological cohesion, failure to harness or adapt to cultural potentialities, and the erosion of values such as creativity, spontaneity, originality, and humanism in favor of imitation, repetition, mass production, and profit-oriented endeavors. Furthermore, the paper contends that these dynamics often result in unrest, conflict, and spiritual and emotional bankruptcy at both individual and societal levels.