Like a black and white kaleidoscope tossed at random

First privately published in the United States in 1920 and ruthlessly reviewed on both sides of the Atlantic, Women in Love remains one of the most provoking novels of this century. Largely because it defies single-mindedness or dogmatic preconceptions, the text has consistently thwarted the critics in their attempts at "nailing it down." The present collection of essays sets out to explore how the novel keeps "walking away with the nail," as Lawrence himself wrote in "Morality and the Novel."