Poetic, but Straightforward
The basic rule of thumb for this book is that Lawrence writes pretty straightforwardly until he starts describing people's passions and/or the natural world—then he bugs out with florid enthusiasm. Lawrence's most intense moments of poeticism emerge in descriptions of nature, as we see in Chapter 2, where he writes:
The sun was going down. Every open evening, the hills of Derbyshire were blazed over with red sunset. Mrs. Morel watched the sun sink from the glistening sky, leaving a soft flower-blue overhead, while the western space went red, as if all the fire had swum down there. (2.138)
We here at Shmoop are particularly fond of the simile, "as if all the fire had swum down there." Yum. Anyway, Lawrence waxes all poetic about nature because he thinks that since the industrial world has worked so hard to make everything completely rational, nature's the only place where true poetry can still exist.
Just think about it. So many people go to work at a factories, punch their work time into a clock, work a specific set of hours, and strive make everything around them as simple and as efficient as possible. Thomas Jordan's factory is completely dark on its bottom floor because it doesn't even want to pay for electricity. Yikes.
But when you get out of the house or the factory into nature in this book, you encounter a sort of beauty that modern rationality hasn't managed to get rid of.
Oh, and one other thing. One of the most unique elements of Lawrence's writing style in Sons and Lovers is the way he attempts to capture the type of dialect that was typical for people from the Nottinghamshire part of England in 1913 Walter Morel speaks with this accent the most, and sometimes, it can even be difficult to figure out what he's saying:
"I'll learn 'im," said Morel. "It none matters to me whose lad 'e is; 'e's none goin' rippin' an' tearin' about just as he's a mind." (3.69)
At first, this way of speaking gives Walter Morel's dialogue a humorous tinge. But as he becomes more threatening and abusive, the dialect takes on a more sinister tone. Kind of funny how the same dialect can sound funny or scary, depending on the speaker's mood or personality, huh?