Over lunch a few days ago, my uncle said that wayward youths don’t always come from broken homes. They also come from well-sheltered families where the parents don’t share the same upbringing and values. My heart skipped a beat when I heard that. Stark reminder or rude awakening? I couldn’t decide, but I can’t help being reminded of the classics I used to immerse myself in when I first started writing many years ago. One of my favourites has to be Son and Lovers by DH Lawrence.
DH Lawrence summarised his novel Sons And Lovers thus:
It follows this idea: a woman of character and refinement goes into the lower class, and has no satisfaction in her own life. She has had a passion for her husband, so her children are born of passion, and have heaps of vitality. But as her sons grow up she selects them as lovers — first the eldest, then the second. These sons are urged into life by their reciprocal love of their mother — urged on and on. But when they come to manhood, they can’t love, because their mother is the strongest power in their lives, and holds them. It’s rather like Goethe and his mother and Frau von Stein and Christiana — As soon as the young men come into contact with women, there’s a split. William gives his sex to a fribble, and his mother holds his soul. But the split kills him, because he doesn’t know where he is. The next son gets a woman who fights for his soul — fights his mother. The son loves his mother — all the sons hate and are jealous of the father. The battle goes on between the mother and the girl, with the son as object. The mother gradually proves stronger, because of the ties of blood. The son decides to leave his soul in his mother’s hands, and, like his elder brother go for passion. He gets passion. Then the split begins to tell again. But, almost unconsciously, the mother realizes what is the matter, and begins to die. The son casts off his mistress, attends to his mother dying. He is left in the end naked of everything, with the drift towards death.
Of course, no one knows the story better than Lawrence himself, but as people who appreciate literature, we have our own insights and interpretations. The dominating character in the novel was intentionally not mentioned in the title – the mother. Even though most modern women will probably get entangled in DH Lawrence’s poetic language and be inclined to put down the book after the first chapter, they instinctively know better than to date or worse, marry a mother’s boy. Daddy’s girl would be another story, but somehow, the mother’s boy sounds the loudest alarms. As toothfully and beautifully depicted in DH Lawrence’s novel, a mother’s boy cannot be a good lover. Lawrence brings the tragic circumstances a step further. Not only do the sons fail in romance, they ultimately fail in life.
DH Lawrence was obviously a depressed literary genius, inspired by his own personal tragedies, but he did manage to throw some filthy realities against the seemingly pristine backdrop of the Victorian era that covered the greater part of his youth. It may sound terrible to the prudish, but in a real and unregulated world, a mother’s love is not always positive. Yet, even in modern times, many mothers who find themselves “overqualified” for their husbands are still virtually spoon-feeding their 18-year-old sons, sheltering them from the tiniest raindrops.
These young men may perform well academically. Their mothers’ total devotion and nurturing ensure that they surpass their fathers in every way – or so it seems. Outside the home, away from their fathers whom they despise due to all the one-sided stories from their mothers, these lads may even have pleasant personalities (at first) but when their unprepared souls enter the harsh real world, they foolishly expect to sail through it and mock at their faltering fathers while doing their mothers proud. Armed with far better skills and qualifications than Dad, they are shocked that they can’t make it any further than their faltering fathers. They begin to see the unjust and undue criticisms that their fathers have suffered all these years. And Mother loses all her credibility.
If Sons and Lovers were written today, perhaps a final twist to the tale can be added. Love can destroy, but love can also turn into hate. The final tragedy in Sons and Lovers seem unconvincing, probably because Lawrence himself did not experience destruction from his mother’s overbearing love. Like Paul and William in Sons and Lovers, the modern son is unable to hold down any job or sustain any healthy relationship with either sex. But the modern son goes one step further. He starts to blame his mother’s “inappropriate love” for all his failures. His dependence turns into total rejection and isolation. Trapped within his own world, he becomes bored with his own life and decides to end it.
Inspiration for my third novel? Let’s see if I have time for the perspiration. Haven’t written something so cheem in quite a while.
