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Arts: From here to maternity A revival of an early play reveals that there's more to D H Lawrence than possessive matriarchs and bullied sons.

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From: The Independent - London
Date: 20020918
Author:RHODA KOENIG

Even in this somewhat underpowered production, D H Lawrence's The Daughter-in-Law packs a tremendous punch for a minor domestic drama with no sex or violence. I went home afterwards, fell asleep, and dreamt I was being run over by a truck. The effect is even more forceful if your opinion of Lawrence is low, based on novels clogged with portentous rant and risible erotics. But in Lawrence's plays we hear the characters without the author. Men and women of the mining country, they are squeezed tight and dry not only by poverty and brutal work but by rock-hard male assumptions about the place ...

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