Set in the rural Midlands of England, the Rainbow chronicles the lives of three generations of the brangwen family, conveying how their rural existence is gradually but profoundly changed by the influx of industry and urbanism. But it is far more ambitious than a family history. Using the language of religious experience, Lawrence shows the struggle of the individual human consciousness in facing an unknowable, infinite reality beyond the commonplace social self. The book is remarkable for its study of the ‘recurrence of love and conflict' Within the marriages it describes; for its attempt to capture the flux of human personality; and for its sense of a mystic procreative continuity within the ‘rhythm of eternity’ both of the seasons and the Christian year. In spite of the view held by T.S. Eliot and reiterated by many contemporary critics, that in this novel is found ‘the profoundest research into human nature’, The Rainbow was banned by Court order within six weeks of its publication in London in 1915 on grounds of obscenity. Today It is considered a brilliantly rendered work of art. This edition reprints the , unexpuragated text.