[1] The title refers to the rod of Aaron in the Old Testament, Moses' brother who built the Golden Calf in the desert for the worship of the Israelites.

Aaron Sisson, a union official in the coal mines of the English Midlands, is trapped in a stale marriage.

During his travels he encounters and befriends Rawdon Lilly, a Lawrence-like writer who nurses Aaron back to health when he is taken ill in post-war London.

Here he moves in intellectual and artistic circles, argues about politics, leadership and submission, and has an affair with an aristocratic lady.

[3] The poet Richard Aldington commented that Aaron's Rod is a hastily written text, similar in this respect to Lawrence's novels The Lost Girl (1920) and Kangaroo (1923).