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“The spirit of place” has become a nearly archetypal trope for Lawrence readers. But it operates as a crux in his writing. Lawrence was often trying to state something unstateable and achieve something unachievable. He produces contradictions―and cruxes―amid numerous repetitions that tend to become self-deconstructing. This essay article’s aim is to examine Lawrence’s concept of “the spirit of place” more closely than critics have previously done, by parsing it in the language of both published versions of the eponymous essay. This is the piece with which Lawrence headed his series of Studies in Classic American Literature, as Chapter One of this collection in both 1918 and 1923―a collection which has risen, over time, to become a classic itself. I look first at Lawrence’s synonyms, characterizations, explanations, and examples for “the spirit of place,” then at when and where he locates it, next at how it works and should work, and finally for whom.
