Abstract

The Rocking-Horse Winner, written by D.H.Lawrence tells a story about a little boy, Paul, who was haunted by an annoying voice “there wasn’t enough money” in his house, spared no effort to win love from his mother by gambling on the horse races. Finally, he fell from the rocking horse and died three days later. This paper is using Paul himself as a starting point: his desire for money under such a money-first society, his desire for love in a cold family and his deep sense of inferiority after failing to gain love from his mother to discuss the causes of his death from a psychological perspective, which uncover the harms of ignoring the emotional needs of kids and display the necessity and effectiveness of Lawrence’s works. All of these are instructive to educate children in the modern society.

Key words: desire; money; love; inferiority

Contents

Abstract

摘要

1 Introduction1

2 Desire for Money.3 

  2.1 The Status Quo of the 1920s.3 

  2.2 Hester’s and Oscar’s Greed for Money.4

  2.3 Paul’s Lust for Money.7   

3 Desire for Love8

3.1 Absence of Family’s Love.8

3.2 Slight Oedipus Complex.11

4 Deep Feeling of Inferiority.11

  4.1 Unreasonable Expectation for Hester11

  4.2 Negative Psychological Compensation.12

5 Conclusion.13

References.15