Renaissance
Motherhood
"Absent
or present, the mother was the parent culturally associated with
childhood."
(A New History of Early English Drama, The
Theater and Domestic Culture, p. 184)
"...the mother bore an awful
burden. She was placed in a position of subordination to her husband
and eventually to the son she had earlier commanded; if she was an aristocrat,
her ability to reproduce males was crucial, yet these sons could be removed
by age seven, as blithely as when Oberon takes away Titania's adopted boy
in A Midsummer Night's Dream" (p. 184).
"Ghost" Mothers
Mother's Legacy
Heroic Maternity?
Conduct & Parenting
Pregnancy, Birth, & Infant Care
"Malevolent Nurture"
Erica M. Lell
**Click here to see my page on childhood
imagery in romantic literature.