Journals (Nottingham Trent University)

Easey, Cerys

Tuesday, Sep 20, YYYY 
LADY OF LOVE 
Cerys Easey
Issue #10 
 
  
Mirjam Nilsson 
What's more ravishing 
and heart-pounding than a 
good love story? A great love 
story that shouldn't even be 
happening.  
Think of Romeo and 
Juliet, making heart-shaped 
eyes at each other despite their 
family rivalry. It's wrong yet 
deliciously sinister! Yet the most 
forbidden of all forbidden love 
stories is the one between Lady 
Constance Chatterley, the lady 
of the manor and her rugged 
gamekeeper Mellors.  
 Taking a blowtorch to the 
rigid social barriers of the 
1920s, Constance betrays not 
only her husband but her 
class.  
This is more than a story of 
adultery - the affair represents a 
challenge to all the conventions 
and expectations women and  
relationships of the time, and if you add to that the rustic, 
tree-filled settings of their encounters, it's no wonder this 
is the stuff of forbidden fantasies (Quite literally having 
sexual encounters in the woodland); escaping her house 
for the woods ‘was her one refuge, her sanctuary’.  
The sexual advances appear opaque through 
Lawrence’s writing especially for a censored writing 
society. During the first sex scene between Mellors and 
Connie, physically descriptions show off the passionate 
love, ‘the peace on earth of her soft quiescent body’. 
However, a 1960 court case over the alleged 
obscenity of Lawrence's original novel prompted the 
Chatterley trial, which helped pave the way for the sexual 
revolution in the UK.  
If you swoon too much and sigh too much, it can start 
to feel gushy (and that is not sexy).  
This reimagined version of Lady Chatterley's Lover sets 
its central love story in a world that's gritty and so 
real that you can feel it.  
Lady Chatterley follows Mellors, a hard-working man in 
a world he can't compete with. Mellors isn't just some 
sexy bit of rough around the edges guy - the sort of from 
a cheesy romantic fantasy, he fulfils all the expectations 
of his character.  
However, in this version the husband Clifford Chatterley 
is not a cartoon image of a snobby, posh, and clueless 
cuckold. Instead, it's a complicated portrait of a 
war hero still recovering from the traumas of the trenches 
and overcoming tremendous obstacles. He is 
handsome and gallant, therefore making the love triangle 
of Clifford, Constance, and Mellors all the 
more intense and moving, because of the sympathy we 
feel for him.  
  


English

Lady of Love

Goodman, Dionne

 
Creative  
Corner 
 
 
 
UNTITLED 
 
By Dionne Goodman 
 
There’s something about love, the way it engulfs 
you, 
making you feel small and cosy.  
Something about its lingering fleeting 
movements, 
Miniscule moments made magnificent in a tidal 
wave of rose-pinks  
and in a hurricane of grey blues, magnificent, 
magnified creations. 
Hand-picked from God’s own apple tree.  
 
Creation and destruction in the name of Love, 
Love for the sake of Love.  
 
 


Untitled

The&nbsp;Relationship between Love and Transformation within Contemporary Literature and during the Covid 19 Pandemic, by Rachel Brenna

Brennan, Rachel

Tuesday, Sep 20, YYYY 
THE RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN LOVE AND 
TRANSFORMATION WITHIN CONTEMPORARY 
LITERATURE AND DURING THE COVID-19 
PANDEMIC 
Rachel Brennan 
Issue #10 
   
 
  
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
<3 
 
  
 
Where do we see the relationship between love and 
transformation within contemporary literature? 
Within Alice Walker’s The Color Purple, a 1982 epistolary 
novel, sisterly love enables the character Celie to be 
transformed from a patriarchally oppressed woman, into a 
strong woman who encapsulates feminist agency with the 
ability to transcend the confines of misogyny. Before Celie 
experiences sisterly love with Sofia, her language reflects 
how she understands women as inferior in society. For 
example, when Sofia defends herself against Harpo, Celie 
encourages him to physically assault Sofia more and then 
says ‘they’re fighting like two mens’ when Sofia fights back. 
This demonstrates how foreign it is for Celie to see a 
woman defend themselves.  
The novel opens with a threat from Alphonso, silencing 
Celie after she is raped, depriving her the right to speak to 
anyone about the attack except God, whom she 
communicates with in the form of letters. This instantly 
conveys how she adheres to the sexual hegemony, 
voiceless to her mother. Conversely, we see the dramatic 
transformation of Celie’s silenced character when she 
experiences sisterly love with Sofia and romantic love with 
Shug.  
Sofia tells Celie of the patriarchal abuse she suffered at 
home, and how sisterly love was a feminist tool to keep her 
and her sisters strong; ‘all the girls stick together’. This 
rebellion begins to invigorate feminist strength onto Celie, 
transforming her character. Celie finds herself sharing her 
abuse story with Sofia too, which is disobedient to what 
Alphonso instructed. This exemplifies Celie’s 
transformation from silenced, to attaining a voice through 
the aid of sisterly love. 
Shug teaches Celie to be empowered by her sexuality and 
sexual identity; this is significant for Celie as the sexual 
abuse she suffered made her view herself as dirty. Making 
love to Shug is rebellious and contends with what men in 
her life have ever encouraged – it enables her to feel 
pleasure for herself rather than satisfying a man. The love 
she experiences with Shug transforms Celie from hating her 
body, to enjoying her body. 
We also see the vehicles which are used to express love, 
undergoing transformation throughout the novel. Celie is 
forced out of her home into an abusive marriage with ‘Mr- 
‘, where she cannot see her sister Nettie again. She is 
oblivious throughout the novel whether Nettie is even 
alive, yet later discovers Nettie is alive and has been raising 
her children. Celie makes this discovery through the letters 
Nettie had written to her.  
Celie responds, expressing her love for her sister through 
the form of letter-writing. Despite the distance, their 
sisterly love is transformed from unattainable, to attainable 
through the epistolary aid of letter-writing to each other. 
Letters enabled the sisters to communicate their love for 
each other through the medium of written discourse. This 
brings me onto my next topic, love which is transformed 
from being ‘face to face’ and physically attainable, to love 
which suffers the challenges of distance, in an era of ‘social 
distancing’.  
 
Where do we see the relationship between love and 
transformation within relationships during the COVID-19 
Pandemic? 
Much like Nettie and Celie who loved each other from a 
distance, due to the restrictions implemented worldwide 
intended to prevent the spread of this airborne virus, people 
all around the world who loved each other were forced to 
love from a distance. The expression of love was transformed 
from a physical, in person interaction, into a non-physical, 
online interaction for those who did not live with the people 
they loved.  
We are informed that ‘physical touch is a key aspect of 
intimacy, a fundamental human need, crucial in maintaining 
and developing intimacy within close relationships’ whereas 
restrictions on social interactions ‘severely restricted the 
number and range of people with whom physical affection 
was possible’. For those who did not live together amid the 
pandemic; platonic lovers, familial lovers, and romantic lovers 
– these people endured an immense transformation within 
their relationships. People were deprived of human touch and 
their relationships were starved of the expression of love 
through physical expression. 
The Covid-19 pandemic transformed people’s ability to 
express love through physical interaction such as hugging and 
kissing, to being completely unable with restrictions such as 
the ‘two metre rule’ in place and the lockdowns which urged 
people to stay at home, away from others.  
This starvation for human touch and physical interaction thus 
resulted in loneliness, yet as Boris Johnson put it, ‘the 
wizardry of technology’ enabled people to make video calls, 
text messages, phone calls, play games and communicate 
with each other. Technology transformed lovers from feeling 
lonely and apart, to being able to express their love and 
experience togetherness in a non-physical way.  
Within Walker’s novel, we see the characters Nettie and Celie 
who utilise letter-writing which builds the communicative 
bridge, overcoming the physical, geographical obstacles which 
restrained their love. Their restrained love is transformed into 
a state of unrestraint through the medium of letters. Likewise, 
throughout the pandemic, lovers who had access to 
technology were able to transform their restrained love, into 
attainable love, through the medium of technology.  
 


The Relationship between Love and Transformation within Contemporary Literature and during the Covid 19 Pandemic

Tinder Profiles:
Romeo, by Mia Collins
Esther, by Ophelia Sno

Collins, Mia

Snow, Ophelia

Romeo and Esther

 
 
A Word from the Editor
Dear Reader, you might at first believe a magazine on the topic of love, romance, 
or relationships is an amalgamation of wishy-washy lovey-dovey bull cr*p written 
by hopeless romantics with nothing much more to say than "love is great", and who 
would blame you? But, within our magazine, you will find that this is simply not the 
case. 
What makes this magazine different is that it is produced in the age of Covid, a time 
where we can all say that, at some point, we felt ‘love-starved’. Be it the longing for 
our partner’s touch, the company of friends, or merely the faces of family members 
whom we missed dearly; All of us missed some form of ‘love’. The loss of contact 
with the outside world made us realise and appreciate what we once had taken for 
granted.  
Thus, comes forth the birth of this magazine. It is an artistic exploration into the 
themes of romance and love within literature, fueled by the very loss of it in the real 
world. In lockdowns 1.0 and 2.0, many of us turned to reading as a form of escapism 
from the dystopian world lurking outside our doors. Alternatively, some of us 
remained 6ft away from our books, at all times! Nevertheless, this literary magazine 
is made with everyone in mind, from the devout book connoisseur to the extremely 
casual reader. So, even if you haven’t read a single book since your GCSEs, we 
can guarantee that there is something to pique your interest.  
The production of this literary magazine is a labour of love, where our team’s full 
commitment made this possible, so thank you for your dedication every step of the 
way, and thank you, dear readers, for choosing to read Love in the Time of Covid.  
Feel free to scour the pages and find something to fall in love with (we know you 
will).  
- Dionne Goodman. 
 


A Word from the Editor

Do pictures really speak a thousand words

Stassi, Antonia

A Review of Albert Kish\u27s short film \u27This is a photograph\u27

Residential schools through the lens of \u27Indian Horse\u2

(KPU), Tae

Residential schools through the lens of \u27Indian Horse\u27

A&nbsp;Review of Billy Ray Belcourt\u27s \u27This Wound is a World\u2

Coley, Eve

A Review of Billy Ray Belcourt\u27s \u27This Wound is a World\u27

de Wit, Abbegail

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS 
 
EDITORS 
 
Journal Editorial Team 
 
Abbegail de Wit – Editor-in-Chief  
 
Katherine McGuigan – Managing Editor 
 
Megan Sprous – Writer and Associate Editor 
 
Amy Barlow - Writer and Associate Editor 
 
Isabel Berry - Writer and Associate Editor 
 
Izzy M. Pleasance - Writer and Associate Editor 
 
Katie Halls - Writer and Associate Editor 
 
Journal Team 2: Book Reviews Editorial Team 
 
Ellie Jacobson – Book Reviews Editor 
 
Shay Abell - Book Reviews Editor 
 
Tom Read – Book Reviews Editor 
 
Callum Clarke – Book Reviews Editor and Copy Editor 
 
Kai Northcott – Copy Editor 
 
Contributing Editors 
 
Antonia Stassi – Social Media Coordinator (Audience Engagement – Canada) 
 
Eve Coley – Administrative Director 
 
 


Acknowledgements

Finding Love Within Ourselves by Georgia Bake

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