The Fox

The Fox is a novella written by D. H. Lawrence. A shorter version appeared in a magazine in 1922, and the expanded text used here was published in 1923.

Set in Berkshire, England, during the First World War, this short novel immerses us in a gripping story of human relationships and the struggle between desire and social convention.

Nellie March and Jill Banford are two women who decide to live a quiet, isolated life on a farm in the countryside, without the help of male laborers.

Their lives are quiet until a young soldier named Henry turns up at the farm, which he knew as a boy, and asks to stay. The young man will provoke tensions between the two women that threaten to break the harmony between them. Prowling around the same farm is the fox they have been trying to shoot, and Lawrence lets the animal and the young man shadow one another throughout the story.

The book is a moving story that questions the gender norms of the time and the role of women in society.

"The two girls were usually known by their surnames, Banford and March. They had taken the farm together, intending to work it all by themselves: that is, they were going to rear chickens, make a living by poultry, and add to this by keeping a cow, and raising one or two young beasts."