How we cite our quotes: (Chapter.Paragraph)
Quote #4
"We must lay him out," the wife said. She put on the kettle, then returning knelt at the feet, and began to unfasten the knotted leather laces. (2.116)
It is definitely worth wondering why Lawrence avoids character names like the plague. Also, why "the wife"? Why not "his wife"?
Quote #5
They never forgot it was death, and the touch of the man's dead body gave them strange emotions, different in each of the women; a great dread possessed them both, the mother felt the lie was given to her womb, she was denied; the wife felt the utter isolation of the human soul, the child within her was a weight apart from her. (2.122)
Hmm, okay, maybe we're now getting a better picture of why Lawrence uses descriptors like "wife" rather than character names. It seems like the characters are feeling pretty disassociated from their own lives, and describing someone as "the wife" plays up that feeling of being alienated. As you can see here, Elizabeth (or "the wife") even feels separated from the child growing inside her. If that's not alienation, we don't know what is. Except maybe this.
Quote #6
And her soul died in her for fear: she knew she had never seen him, he had never seen her, they had met in the dark and had fought in the dark, not knowing whom they met nor whom they fought. (2.128)
Here, we get Elizabeth reflecting on her relationship with her husband. Seeing his body, she seems to have realized she never really knew him and vice versa. Pretty sad stuff, if you ask us.