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This paper examines Lawrence’s contradictory attitudes to nationalism through his interest in the songs of the peoples in the places where he lived and their impact on his poetics and politics. The rhythms of English folk songs recur throughout his oeuvre, but it was the ‘Red Indian singing to the drum” (5L 570) that inspired his “song cycle” in The Plumed Serpent (1926). To what extent does this controversial novel reflect contemporary discourses of nationalism and/or cultural imperialism –or do his “Songs and Hymns of Quetzalcoatl” provide a voice for the people of Mexico and a musical programme for the reconstruction of the post-revolutionary Mexican nation?