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The symbolism of D.H. Lawrence's "Rocking Horse Winner"
“The Rocking-Horse Winner”, by D.H. Lawrence contain symbolism that capitalist society in which life becomes pointless and where the gifts are become nothing. The main character, gift from god allows him to see the winner of horse races before they happen. His gift slowly eats away his soul ,however eventually kills him because the more he wins, the less he has of himself. A capitalist society, is never satisfied with what you have. The symbolism reenforces the idea of the endless struggle to gain more it is never enough and shows the reader that money is not the true goal of life. Paul is a symbolizes the struggle for money within our capitalist society. In the beginning he is the symbol of innocence. He queries his mother, about luck and money is so important. The author is trying to show through Paul that money is not a worthy driving force. As he is growing up he always feels this faceless need for more, and he starts to ride his rocking horse to find a way to help his family. Paul has a skill that when he rides his childhood rocking horse he can find the winner to horse races, but no matter how much he wins there is always this hunger for more. Paul shows that it is pointless to try to make money for the point of making money because we give ourselves and the things we love to that goal, and so it slowly destroys everything in our life. Therefore, the quest for money will only leave us with emptiness shells, and to our own self death. Lawrence’s uses Paul’s rocking horse to show insight into the workings of capitalism, and uses the rocking horse as a symbol of man’s pointless struggle in a capitalist society. It shows that no matter what happens, we will go nowhere just like the horse never goes forward, and we will never accomplish anything in a capitalist society. It shows how the lust for money will make our gifts into something dark and worthless, and we will never have enough. At the end of the story, Paul put his heart and soul into that horse and it caused him to die for no gain. It was his blind lust for the empty money that caused his gift to become empty, and just as Paul’s gifts become empty so do ours. Lawrence also uses the method of race tracks and race horses, to win money, as a symbol to show how unsure and circular the empty wants of capitalism is. I mean its circular because win or lose, we would always have to go back to the race track to get more. Also it just goes around and around, over and over, but never really going anywhere; just like the rocking horse.The race track symbolize life, always needing and never stopping; we always are lusting after the next race, win or lose. The tracks shows us nothing but the endless press forward without going anywhere, and the more we try in a capital based society the more we need: a pointless cycle. Paul’s mother is a good example of someone living in the capitalist society acts like. Lawrence writes in the opening pages that the mother did not love her children because she has an empty hole in her heart. This emptiness is created from the empty society she is governed by, and how it did nothing but take from her. She is more caring for the things she wants then her own children; she finds that her social class is more important. She uses Paul to gain status within the social class frame work by sending him to a better school and getting a private teacher. I believe that she shows how people act normally within our money lusting society. However, Lawrence uses more then just the mother to show the consuming lust, the house is another key symbol for the capitalist based lust for more. At the beginning of the story the house whispers to the children saying that is wants things. Once Paul gives his mother money, and she starts buy new things for the house. The house starts yelling at Paul to get more, and this shows the ever present need for more with in the material based capitalists society. Paul tries to get more money, however, it results in his death and the lose of his gift. This never needing need the house has shows us that the more we have generally the most unrested we are. I believe that Lawrence’s short story is to show us the endless pain we endure for a pointless goal for more money that is placed on us from birth. He uses a wide range of symbols to show the reader the truth of the world we live in; that the more we lust after pointless material wealth we lose the things most important to us. As Paul lusted for more he lost his life; showing us that we should care about the thing most dear, our own life.

Bibliography Gioia, Dana, and R.S Gwynn eds. The Art of Short Story, 52 Great Authors, Their Best Short Fiction, and Their Insights on Writing. New York: Pearson, 2006.