How we cite our quotes: (Chapter.Paragraph)
Quote #1
They argued with the men over philosophical, sociological and artistic matters, they were just as good as the men themselves: only better, since they were women. (1.11)
It's hard to tell if D. H. is being serious about this (we're going to guess not). He probably means the exact opposite—that women shouldn't be arguing about philosophical, sociological, and artistic matters. Instead, they should probably be bringing the men some sammiches.
Quote #2
She was too feminine to be quite smart. (2.37)
This passage seems to confirm that Lawrence doesn't think too highly of women's intellectual abilities, but this is actually a British use of the word "smart" to mean "cool" or "fashionable." In the 1920s, all the cool girls were skinny and flat-chested, but Connie has curves.
Quote #3
"A woman wants you to like her and talk to her, and at the same time love her and desire her; and it seems to me the two things are mutually exclusive." (6.9)
Tommy Dukes doesn't believe in companionate marriage (the idea that you can be friends with the person you marry). Connie calls him her "oracle" (6.1) about men and women—so does Lady Chatterley's Lover agree? Does Mellors?
Quote #4
But she had that queer sort of bossiness, endless assertion of her own will, which is one of the signs of insanity in modern woman. She thought she was utterly subservient and living for others. (9.6)
Modern women are crazy. We know they're crazy, because they want to have their own way and sometimes give the orders instead of taking them. Yeah, that sounds completely insane to us.
Quote #5
No, she would give up her hard bright female power; she was weary of it, stiffened with it; she would sink in the new bath of life, in the depths of her womb and her bowels that sang the voiceless song of adoration. (10.328)
Listen up, ladies: you don't need to be strong and powerful. All you need to do is find a nice man to adore, and everything will be fine. That sounds like a great life plan.
Quote #6
But there, when I look at women who's never really been warmed through by a man, well, they seem to me poor doolowls after all, no matter how they may dress up and gad. (11.180-181)
Mrs. Bolton is just so concerned about women who dress up and go out for a good time, because they've clearly never had a real man. She just pities them and worries about them. The Internet gives us a word for this: concern-trolling.
Quote #7
She was gone, she was not, and she was born: a woman. (12.147)
Mellors is so good at sex that he can actually restore Connie's femininity. He turns her from a kind ofobnoxious modern girl into a soft, melting, womanly puddle. That he can then walk all over.
Quote #8
"But they're mostly the Lesbian sort. It's astonishing how Lesbian women are, consciously or unconsciously. Seems to me they're nearly all Lesbian." (14.111)
Translation: "Dude, I gave that chick my number but she turned me down. She's so totally a lesbian."
Quote #9
Connie flushed darker with rage, at the suggestion. Yet, while her passion was on her, she could not lie. She could not even pretend there was nothing between herself and the keeper. She looked at the other woman, who stood so sly, with her head dropped: yet somehow, in her femaleness, an ally. (16.23)
Connie is an aristocrat, but she has more in common with Mrs. Bolton for being a woman than she does with Clifford, who's one of her class. That's a big "no duh" for us, but actually for centuries—up until about the 17th and 18th centuries—the big difference was class rather than gender. Women weren't considered fundamentally different from men; they were just defective men.
Quote #10
"She declared she'll never leave him alone while he lives. Though what I say is, if he was so beastly to her, why is she so anxious to go back to him? But of course she's coming near her change of life, for she's years older than he is. And these common, violent women always go partly insane when the change of life comes upon them."(17.81)
"The change of life" is a polite way of saying menopause. In other words, women go crazy when they stop being able to breed. One way or another, women are controlled by their wombs—just like men by a certain other part of their body.