D. H. Lawrence

Abstract

Lawrence first went to Italy in September, 1912, to Lake Garda, where he and Frieda stayed until April of the following year. As soon as he arrives there, his letters are full of enthusiasm for the beauty of the landscape and the sympathetic ambiance of the peasants. It is the beginning of an attachment to Italy which lasted throughout his life, surviving his annoyance with the Italian habit after the first world war of blaming every Englishman personally for the problems of the exchange rate, and taking him back to Italy again and again, even despite his dislike of Italian food. It was to Italy that Lawrence went as soon as he could get away from England after the war, and of the last ten years of his life four were spent in Italy — a remarkable amount when one considers that those ten years included his journeys to Ceylon, Australia and North America. Of the same period he spent something less than six months in England.