Original subtitles

A background rather like Lawrence's own, then.

Lawrence didn't go to university, he went to a teacher's training college.

And perhaps there's something particular about a Nottinghamshire mining village upbringing.

We're not all the same, us working class lads, you know. No, indeed.

And you are now a Senior Lecturer in English at Leicester University,

and you lecture on Lawrence to the young people under your care. Yes, I do.

This book, Lady Chatterley's Lover, has been described in Court

as little more than vicious indulgence in sex and sensuality.

Is that a valid description of the book?

Not at all. It is not vicious.

It is highly virtuous, and if anything puritanical.

Did you say...

virtuous and puritanical? Yes, sir.

I believe it's a very moral book.

In fact, you could say that the physical, sexual side is not that important to Lawrence.

I know that sounds paradoxical.

What Lawrence is interested in is a relationship which is, in the deepest sense, spiritual.

It's a kind of sacrament for him.

So what exactly do you mean by saying that this is a moral book?

I mean that the overwhelming impression I get, as a careful reader,

is of the enormous reverence which must be paid by one human being to another in a physical relationship.

These relationships are not matters in which we use each other like animals.

This spirit seems to me to pervade the book throughout,

and so I would call the book highly moral and not at all degrading of sex.

And the four-letter words have been referred to. What is your view on them?

They are part of the normal discourse of many people, and not only working class people.

They are used very freely indeed in everyday life.

50 yards from the court this morning I heard a man say "fuck" three times as he passed me.

He said, "Fuck it, fuck it, fuck it!" as he went past.

If you have worked on a building site, as I have, you will hear it over and over again.

The word is used in contempt, of course, as a term of abuse.

Lawrence wanted to re-establish its proper use. Which is?

As the word for the sexual act.

We have no word in English for it that isn't either a long abstraction,

or a euphemism, and we're constantly running away from it, or dissolving into dots, in a passage like this.

Lawrence wanted us to say, "This is what one does."

In a simple, ordinary way, one fucks - with no sniggering or dirt.

One fucks.

I wonder, Mr Hoggart, do you belong to that body of people who oppose all prosecutions for obscenity?

Not at all. But I do resent the fact that ordinary men and women should be prevented

from reading a serious book by a great writer who has something of importance to say.

I see.

Now, you described this book as "highly virtuous, if not puritanical".

That is your genuine and considered view, is it? Yes, it is.

Well, perhaps I've spent my whole life under a misapprehension of the meaning of the word puritanical".

Can you enlighten me?

Yes. Many people live their lives under the same misapprehension.

This is the way that language decays.

Today, the word has been extended to mean someone who's against anything pleasurable, particularly sex.

Its true meaning is somebody who belongs to the tradition of British Puritanism,

and the defining feature of that is an intense sense of responsibility for one's conscience.

In this sense, the book is puritanical.

I am obliged to you for that lecture.

In fact, one could say...

Mr Hoggart, I don't want to stop you if you have something further to say,

but the question I want to ask you is quite a simple one to answer without another lecture.

We are not at Leicester University at the moment.

Now I want to see more precisely what you describe as "puritanical".

Would you look at page 222 of the book?

Lady Chatterley is drying her hair in front of the fire, after one of their bouts,

when he took her, and I quote, "like an animal.

"He stroked her tail with his hand,

"long and subtly taking in the curves and the globefulness.

" 'Tha's got such a nice tail on thee.

" 'It's the nicest, nicest woman's arse as is.

" 'An' ivery bit of it is woman, woman, sure as nuts.

" 'Thart not one of them button arsed lasses as should be lads, are ter!

" 'Tha's got a real soft sloping bottom on thee, as a man loves in 'is guts.' "

Is that a passage you would describe as "puritanical"?

Yes, puritanical, and poignant, and tender.

"All the while he spoke he exquisitely stroked the rounded tail,

"till it seemed as if a slippery sort of fire came from it into his hand.

"And his fingertips touched the two secret openings to her body,

"time after time, with a soft little brush of fire." Is that puritanical?

Yes, indeed it is.

I see. " 'An' if tha shits an' if tha pisses, I'm glad.

" 'I don't want a woman as couldna shit nor piss.' " Is that puritanical? Yes, it is.

" 'Here tha shits and here tha pisses an' I lay my hand on 'em both and I like thee for it.

" 'I like thee for it. Tha's got a proper woman's arse, proud of itself.

" 'It's none ashamed of itself, this isna."

"He laid his hand close and firm over her secret places, in a kind of close greeting."

And that is puritanical, is it?

In my view, it is puritanical, and poignant, and tender.

Do you feel puritanical?

Not really. Tell you the truth, I didn't have the faintest idea what he was talking about, that man.

He was saying that sex is like a sacrament, or it was for Lawrence

and for Mellors and Lady Chatterley.

What's that got to do with Lawrence?

That Bishop said that Lawrence wasn't even a Christian.

I think he worshipped his penis. I think most men do, actually.

The stuff you come out with.

Well, it's true, isn't it? I don't worship my...penis.

No, but you follow it where it leads, don't you?

Is that what happened with me and you?

Isn't it?

Look, it's stirring, I think it overheard us.

John Thomas.

That chap was wrong, wasn't he?

Lawrence wasn't all for plain speaking, not all together.

Mellors has a pet name for it. His penis is John Thomas and her vagina's Lady Jane.

When he's weaves flowers through her pubic hair, and she winds creeping Jenny round his penis.

Would you like me to do that for you?

If you like.

I think we should try out everything they try out, don't you? All right.

Not many forests round here, though.

We'll have to improvise.

Meanwhile...

D'you like this?

Yeah.

Sylvia won't do anything like this. She says it's dirty.

Poor Sylvia.

I'll have to write her a little note,

tell her what she's missing.

PANTING

I wish...

What?

It could be just you and me.

That's what he said in the book.

But the world's so full of other people.

Old Parker was in a right mood today. Was he?

Yeah. Taking it out on everyone.

Just because he's the boss, he thinks he can carry on like a two year old in a tantrum.

Nasty old bugger. Yeah. What can you do, though?

I tell you what I do.

I look at the clock, and I think, in two hours' time, or whatever it is,

I'll be home, with somebody who's so much nicer than you, you old bugger.

Well, look at you. I was only paying you a compliment!

Well, who'd have thought it? What?

You and I together in bed, like this.

And all thanks to DH Lawrence.

Actually, I've decided I'm not that keen on DH Lawrence or his gamekeeper.

Why's that, then? He's always telling her things, going on at her.

This is how life ought to be, this is what's wrong with women,

this is what I like and don't like.

And when they make love, it's always him in charge.

I thought that's what you all like. Well, you're wrong. Anyway, you're not like that.

I might be, given the chance.

I don't think so. And you've got a sense of humour.

When you really think about it, it's not a great book at all,

it's a lot of preaching and bullying and wishful thinking.

It got you going, though. Yes, I know, and I'm so ashamed.

Anyway, it wasn't the book that got me going,

it was you, with your bedroom eyes.

I'd never have thought those wicked thoughts about any of those other men.

What's so special about me?

Oh, now he's fishing for compliments!

But I'll tell you. It's your innocence. I'm not that innocent.

Yes, you are, you're innocent, like an animal.

There's no guile about you.

And from the first look, I could tell you really want it,

all of it.

I don't think most men do,

they just pretend they do,

or they really want something else -

power usually...

to get you where they want you.

So I'm different, am I?

Yes, you are.

You make me happy.

I call Mr Francis Cammaerts.

Call Mr John Connell.

Miss Sarah Beryl Jones.

Mr Norman St John Stevas.

I call Dr James Hemming.

Mr Francis Williams.

Call Anne Scott-James

Mr Raymond Williams.

Call Mr CK Young.

Call Mr Iain Foster.

Dr CV Wedgwood.

I call Sir Stanley Unwin.

Professor Kenneth Muir.

Mr Cecil Day-Lewis.

Call Miss Dilys Powell.

Mr Walter Allen.

Call Mr Roy Jenkins.

Mr Stephen Potter.

Call Miss Janet Adam-Smith.

Mr Noel Annan.

Mr Hector Hetherington.

Mr Hetherington, you are editor of the Manchester Guardian,

and a member of the Royal Commission on the Police.

Would you tell us what you would say is the theme or meaning of Lady Chatterley's Lover?

Well, the importance of the book to me

was as an exposition of the beauty and goodness of physical love at its best...

..of the redeeming power of sex, and the importance of tenderness.

Thank you.

No questions.

Mr Gardener, it is in my mind that the jury may be wondering how much longer this is going to go on.

How many more witnesses may we expect?

My Lord, I intend to call no witnesses.

Mr Gardiner? My Lord, I have another 36 witnesses waiting to testify to the merit of Lady Chatterley's Lover,

but in view of my learned friend's indication that there will be no witnesses for the prosecution,

I propose to call only one more witness.

Call Miss Bernadine Wall.

Miss Wall, you've just come down from Cambridge? That's right.

And you're writing a novel yourself, I gather.

Yes. And you have read Lady Chatterley's Lover?

Yes. I read it first in an expurgated edition, then more recently as Lawrence wrote it.

And what's your opinion of the unexpurgated version?

It was much better. It gave a positive contrast.

The love affair contrasted with the deadness of the industrial society he was describing.

It held out a hope that this was not all, that there was some way out of this drab, daily existence.

Thank you.

Now, as to the four-letter words in the book, had you known them before you read the book? Yes, of course.

From what sort of age? My Lord, what has this to do with the literary merit of the book?

Very little, I should think.

My Lord, I'll withdraw the question.

And while I am on my feet, my Lord,

might I ask whether anybody who has just come down from Cambridge can be tendered as a literary expert?

She has started to write a novel.

So she has, my Lord. I suppose we must all start somewhere.

Carry on, Mr Gardiner. From the point of view of literary merit,

how does this book compare with others you have read,

in its treatment of human relations, including sexual relations?

It treats that relationship with great dignity.

More so, I think, than any novel I have ever read.

Thank you, Miss Wall.

No questions.

Fuck. Fucking.

That was a lovely fuck.

I love your cock in my cunt.

Go on.

Now you say something.

I love the feel of your...

Go on.

Cunt round my cock. No, I don't like it.

I mean, I like it, but I don't like saying it out loud like that, it's like talking dirty.

And what's wrong with talking dirty?

I bet you don't normally use words like that.

Yes, you're right.

But I can with you.

Why's that? Because I'm a bit of rough?

You're not a bit of rough, Keith.

I think you're rather more respectable than me.

What I meant was...

..this is our own little world here,

we can say what we like. Yeah.

Suppose so.

I know it's not easy to say those words,

but it felt all right just then.

It felt truthful.

And I think DH Lawrence would have thoroughly approved of me.

And you must have liked it.

Tell you the truth...

..I was a bit shocked to hear that from a woman.

You were, weren't you?

You're so sweet.

What?

What's the matter?

I don't like being patronised, that's what's. I wasn't. Truly.

You don't think of me as equal, that's why it's all so easy for you. Well, if you're going to sulk...

I'm not sulking, I'm just saying what's true.

This is all a game for you. I'm just...an amusement to you,

and when jury service is over, that's it, off you'll go, never a backward look.

What was your plan? To dedicate the rest of your life to me?

You're the one who's married, after all.

Do you want to stop this now? Because you can if you like.

No. I don't want to stop. Then let me say what I was going to just now.

These times with you,

they've been the best times I've had since...

..I don't know when.

You make me happy.

I love...

I love making love with you.

Fucking.

Yes. Fucking.

Yeah, you're right.

That's what it is.

Why call it anything else?

Fucking.

Cock. Cunt.

You know what? You've got a wonderful cunt.

Well, I think it's probably quite an ordinary cunt,

but it's all for you. This week.

This week for certain,

after that, who knows?

I think we should make the most of it. Don't you?

She made me feel like...a God or something.

When we were in her little flat,

it felt like we had the whole world in there.

The funny thing was...

..it didn't make me go off Sylvia or nothing.

I felt so...

happy, strong...

..confident.

I thought,

"What's wrong with a man having two women?"

Well, we really do have a mixed jury tonight.

Let's have the first record.

MUSIC: "Blue Angel" by Roy Orbison

What you looking at? See anything you like?

Yeah. Want to do anything about it?

Yeah.

Don't mind if I do.

It's not nine o'clock yet.

I don't care. Neither do I, then.

Come on. Let's get this off. No, I'll be cold. No, you won't.

That's it.

That's nice, that is.

And this is nice.

And this is.

Hey, I don't like that. Shush. You will.

I promise. Let me.

No, leave off. Keith!

What's the matter?

What is it? Come on, Sylve. Turn round.

Don't touch me, you bastard! Come on, Sylve. What's the matter?

You know what's the matter! What?

You've got another woman, haven't you? How could I have another woman?

I don't know, but you have, haven't you?

You've got another woman and you do that with her!

Oh, come on, Sylve, don't cry. Get off me! It's true, isn't it?

It's true!

Yes, it's true.

Oh, Christ. Look... I don't want to know anything about it!

I don't want to know anything about her!

You can go to her if you like!

Just leave me alone, that's all!

Members of the jury,

this case has lasted several days,

and you have listened to a great deal of evidence and argument with great patience and close attention.

You have heard a great number of witnesses testify to the merit of this book,

and not one of them

thought it liable to deprave or corrupt.

And what has the prosecution produced?

Not one single witness has been found

to come to court to say anything against Lawrence, or his book.

The prosecution has made a point of reminding you that this is a book published at three and sixpence,

and thus affordable to anybody.

There is a suggestion that it might be all right if it were published as an expensive limited edition,

not for the common man or woman.

My learned friend asks, "Is it a book you would even wish your wife or your servants to read?"

Now, I don't want to upset the prosecution by suggesting

that there are nowadays some people who don't have servants.

But isn't everybody, whether earning £10 a week, or £20 a week,

equally interested in the society in which we live...

..and equally involved in the problems of relationships,

including sexual relationships?

And shouldn't wives be allowed to read about these things, as well as their husbands?

And isn't it time

we rescued Lawrence's name

from the quite unfair reputation it has had,

and allow our people...

..his people -

to judge for themselves?

Members of the jury...

..I leave Lawrence's reputation,

and the reputation of Penguin Books...

..in your hands.

Members of the jury, as you will now know,

this case is one of immense importance, with huge and far-reaching consequences.

In a matter of such gravity, I do not propose to waste your time by answering debating points.

It is easy enough to poke fun at the prosecution, especially in a case of this kind,

but I am not going to refer to any such matters.

Now, my learned friend has examined a number of witnesses in support of the book.

Who have we had? Bishops, prebendaries, other clergymen,

school teachers, a fashion editor, even a young girl who has just started her first novel.

All under the guise of literary experts.

I know that you will not be browbeaten by evidence given by these people.

You will judge this as ordinary people,

your feet on the ground, reading this book and judging it according to your own moral standards.

And there must be standards, must there not?

There must be some restraint, or the floodgates will open.

"A book of moral purpose," one witness called it.

What moral purpose?

If your husband can't satisfy you, go and copulate with other men until you find someone who can.

Isn't that what a young person reading the book would take from it?

Remember that you, and you alone, are the sole judge of the facts in this case.

And in this context,

I would ask your forgiveness for referring you to a passage on page 246.

It is a passage that has not previously been referred to during this trial.

It is that passage which describes what is called "the night of sensual passion".

"It was a night of sensual passion, in which she was a little startled and almost unwilling.

"Though a little frightened, she let him have his way."

Not very easy, you know, to know what he is driving at in that passage.

"And the reckless, shameless sensuality

"shook her to her foundations, stripped her to the very last, and made a different woman of her.

"Burning out the shames, the deepest, oldest shames, in the most secret places.

"It cost her an effort to let him have his way and his will of her."

One wonders why, with all the experiences that had gone before.

"It took some getting at, the core of the physical jungle, the last and deepest recess of organic shame."

I don't know. Is this stuff having a good influence on the young reader?

Members of the jury, do you not think this book has a false conception

of what proper thought and conduct ought to be?

In a time when some proper conception is so badly needed?

I submit to you that there can be but one answer.

Members of the jury, we are approaching the end of this case,

to which you have listened with the greatest care and attention.

I propose that we adjourn until tomorrow, when I will sum up the evidence,

and you will retire to consider your verdict.

All rise!

Let off a bit early today, then!

Time off for good behaviour!

See you in the morning. Right-o.

Evening.

What's the matter?

See that? All right for some, eh?

Well, I was quite surprised at Griffith-Jones today.

"The night of sensual passion!"

I didn't get what he was on about.

Really? Didn't you? I didn't get it.

He was talking about buggery, Keith.

Was he?

That's what homos do, isn't it? Well, not just homos, actually.

Bloody hell.

You mean, you?

It was something Ray was rather keen on.

I didn't actually care for it very much.

Bloody hell.

Ain't it against the law?

What's wrong? Sylvia knows.

You told her? She just sort of knew.

I couldn't deny it. I've never been any good at telling lies.

No.

What did you tell her about me? Nothing. She didn't want to know.

She's all upset.

That's why you nearly didn't come today. Yeah.

But you did come.

I couldn't help myself.

Well, since you are here...

You don't have to.

I want you to.

I want us to do everything they did.

I want to give you everything she gave him.

I want you to give me everything he gave her.

"She had to be a passive, consenting thing, like a slave, a physical slave.

"Yet the passion licked round her, consuming,

"and when the sensual flame of it pressed through her bowels and breast, she thought she was dying.

"She often wondered what Abelard meant, when he said that in their year of love,

"he and Heloise had passed through all the stages and refinements of passion.

"She felt, now, she had come to the real bed-rock of her nature,

"and was essentially shameless."

Stay with me.

Please?

In a bleak warehouse near London Airport,

tens of thousands of copies of Lady Chatterley's Lover are being packaged up and made ready for delivery.

It's in the hands of the jury.

Will they go on sale or be pulped?

Members of the jury, you are the sole judges of the facts.

As we all know, these days the world seems to be full of experts.

But our criminal law is based on the view that the jury takes of the facts,

and not the view that experts say you should take.

You've got to look at the book as one you yourselves might have bought for three shillings and sixpence,

and then you must ask yourselves the question, "Does it tend to deprave and corrupt?"

Now, you have been told that it is a moral tract,

and a book that Christians should read.

But what do you think?

What is the story?

A woman has sexual intercourse before she is married,

and then, after she is married, commits adultery with someone called Michaelis,

and then proceeds to have adulterous intercourse with her husband's gamekeeper.

And that is described, you may think,

in the most lurid way.

If you have any reasonable doubt whether it has been proved to your satisfaction

that the tendency of this book is to deprave and corrupt morals, of course you will acquit.

On the other hand, if you are satisfied that the book

does have a tendency to deprave and corrupt, of course you will not hesitate to say so.

Now, a vast number of witnesses have been called.

But you are not governed by the opinions they have expressed.

You are the judges of the matter.

You might think that some of them proceeded on the basis,

this is a book by Lawrence, therefore this is a good book.

You must make up your own minds about that.

So, if you'd be kind enough to retire and consider your verdict and tell me how you find.

All rise!

Well, who'd like to start us off?

Well, I'd say guilty. If that's not a dirty book, I don't know what is.

I mean, a laugh's a laugh, but I don't mind saying I found it quite shocking in parts.

And as to literary merit?

I don't think it's clever sticking in those four-letter words in.

My dad used to say swearing was the sign of an impoverished vocabulary.

I agree with him. I think it should be banned.

The judge seemed to think we should return a guilty verdict.

He also said we didn't have to follow his opinion.

True. It's interesting that the prosecution didn't call any expert witnesses.

They didn't need any. It's like the judge said.

I think it's rather more likely that they couldn't find any.

You think it should be banned.

Do you really think it might deprave or corrupt anybody?

That's not the point. It should be banned on grounds of public decency.

It's exactly as the prosecution put it.

Publish this and you've opened the floodgates, you've opened the way for any kind of filthy rubbish.

We'll be poisoning the minds of our own children, and generations to follow.

Is this what we want the 1960s to be?

Is this what we fought two world wars for, the freedom to publish dirty books?

But this isn't a dirty book!

There's nothing dirty about sex.

It's natural, isn't it?

And I don't like the idea of anyone telling me what I'm allowed to read and not allowed to read.

And I don't want to be the one to tell anyone else, except my own kids,

and they're grown up now anyway, and they can choose for themselves.

Cos that's what we're here for, isn't it,

to say if other people can read it?

Well, it hasn't done any of us any harm, has it?

I wonder if it has.

Do any of us think that we have been depraved or corrupted by reading Lady Chatterley's Lover?

Well, who'd answer yes to a question like that?

That is the question we are asked to answer.

And perhaps the best way to answer it is to ask ourselves, have I been depraved or corrupted by this book?

We've been picked at random - 12 ordinary men and women.

If the book has a tendency to deprave and corrupt,

then it's likely, isn't it, that it would have had that effect on us,

or at least some of us. So, has it?

Well, I don't know about anyone else, but I've been a bit...you know...shook up by it.

Reading this book, I feel like I might be missing out on things, you know...sex and that.

I don't mean to say I've never had it or anything,

but not like in the book.

And it sort of makes you think,

"Maybe I should," sort of thing, but I don't suppose I ever shall.

Is that depraved and corrupted? I wouldn't have thought so. Wouldn't you?

I think our friend here has put his finger on something.

What it is is this, the man who wrote this book is saying sex is everything,

and any kind of behaviour is justified in the search for sex, sex, and more sex!

He's saying it's perfectly fine for women to behave like whores before marriage and in marriage,

it's perfectly fine to hold your marriage vows with contempt, all for the sake of sex.

He's telling us that we should indulge and satisfy our appetites like farmyard animals!

If that's not depraving and corrupting, I don't know what is!

All he's doing is asking us to think about our lives.

And what result has that had in your case, may I ask?

Or perhaps I don't need to ask.

I wouldn't say I'd been depraved or corrupted by Lady Chatterley's Lover,

but I would say I've been affected by it.

But that's not a bad thing, that's a good thing, isn't it?

He's challenging us to look at our lives.

He's saying that some things are so...

special,

they're worth sacrificing anything for.

And sex...really good sex... is such a strong thing,

it just smashes up your whole life and puts it together in a different way.

If you find that passion and tenderness with someone...

..you have to follow it.

That's what he's saying.

But you can't just live your whole life like that.

Maybe Lawrence could, but we can't.

I mean, you'd just burn yourself up...

..wouldn't you?

Wouldn't it be worth it?

They're coming back.

Members of the jury, are you agreed upon your verdict? We are.

Do you find that Penguin Books are guilty or not guilty of publishing an obscene article?

Not guilty.

CHEERING AND APPLAUSE

Silence in court!

Silence in court!

Silence in court!

I still don't know whether we done the right thing.

Not the verdict - I mean, me and Helena.

It was thinking about Sylvia and the baby coming, that and thinking,

"Well, like Helena said - sex isn't everything."

Maybe I was wrong.

But in a funny sort of way,

I think it was good for us, me and Sylvia, I mean.

Not at first, of course.

A bit rough at first,

but we stayed together.

It seems funny now,

all that passion.

All such a long time ago.

Yes, I married again, to a very nice man indeed.

He died three years ago. We were very happy.

I was very lucky.

But the most intense, the most important experience of my life, I'd have to say,

I'd have to say,

was that week of sex, that week of love I had with Keith.

My Chatterley affair.

The time now is five minutes to 12, to zero hour, because here in this bookshop in the heart of London,

Lady Chatterley goes on sale at 12 noon sharp.

So let's wait and see how the rush develops and see what happens.

One copy only.

Thank you.

Two, please. One only. Only one.

Why are you buying a copy? Just to see what it's about.

Why do you want a copy?

We've heard so much about it, I just want to have a look. How about you?

I shall be doing a course on the modern novel at university.

Why do you want a copy of Lady Chatterley?

How about you? Just to find out what it's all about.

Why do you want a copy? I'm buying it for somebody else.

You're buying it for somebody else?

Why do you want a copy? For my wife. For your wife?