“A real man doesn't have to run from his mother, and may even have to face the reality that no great deed is going to be great enough for him to ransom himself completely, and he may always be in his mother's debt. If he understands that . . . he won't have to feel guilty, and he won't have to please her completely. He can go ahead and be nice to her and let her be part of his life.” IfsMenFeelsMayRealEnoughRealityRunningFacesMotherNicePleaseDeedsDebtGuiltyBeing NiceReal MenRansom Author:Frank Pittman
“We long for our father. We wear his clothes, and actually try to fill his shoes. . . . We hang on to him, begging him to teach ushow to do whatever is masculine, to throw balls or be in the woods or go see where he works. . . . We want our fathers to protect us from coming too completely under the control of our mothers. . . . We want to be seen with Dad, hanging out with men and doing men things.” MenWantTryingLongMotherFatherTeachDadProtectClothesBallsShoesWoodsHanging OutMasculineOur FatherBeggingDoing Me Author:Frank Pittman
“At the heart of male bonding is this experience of boys in early puberty: they know they must break free from their mothers and the civilized world of women, but they are not ready yet for the world of men, so they are only at home with other boys, equally outcast, equally frightened, and equally involved in posturing what they believe to be manhood.” KnowsMenWorldBelieveHeartHomeMotherBoysBreakReadyInvolvedMalesCivilizedFrightenedManhoodNot ReadyOutcastBondingPuberty Author:Frank Pittman
“It's not that we have too much mother, but too little father. We can't forgive our mothers for taking the place of our fathers until we are ready to see that the point of a man's life is to be a father and a mentor, and we can't do that because we don't know how we would be a father or a mentor when we never had one.” KnowsMenLittlesWould BeLife IsMotherFatherKnow HowToo MuchReadyForgivingMentorOur FatherCan't Forgive Author:Frank Pittman
“Philip Galanes has fashioned a novel both bleak and funny about a young man's struggle to sort out his troubled love: the too-strong love for his mother, the too-weak love for his suicidal father, and the all-consuming love of anonymous sexual encounters. Pointed and acute, this story tells of the narrator's many betrayals of others and their many betrayals of him. It exists in an uncomfortable moral space where the humor of terrible things sometimes outweighs, but never obscures, their poignancy.” MenSometimesStoriesYoungMotherFatherStrongSpaceMoralNovelStruggleTerribleWeakBetrayalUncomfortableYoung ManEncountersSuicidalTerrible ThingsConsumingBleakPhilipNarratorsStrong LovePoignancyConsuming LoveWeak Love Author:Andrew Solomon
“[My mother told me:] "You must decide whether you want to get married someday, or have a career."... I set my sights on the career. I thought, what does any man really have to offer me?” MenWantDoeMotherCareersOffersMarriedSightSomeday Author:Annie Elizabeth Delany
“When women reach the age of maturity, Mother Nature sometimes overworks their frustration to the point of irrationalism. Like themiddle-aged man...who finds himself looking longingly at a girl in her early twenties.” MenSometimesAgeMotherGirlWomenTwentiesMaturityFrustrationMiddle AgesMother NatureOverwork Author:Mark Hanna
“Ideas about mothers have swung historically with the roles of women. When women were needed to work the fields or shops, experts claimed that children didn't need them much. Mothers, who might be too soft and sentimental, could even be bad for children's character development. But when men left home during the Industrial Revolution to work elsewhere, women were "needed" at home. The cult of domesticity and motherhood became a virtue that kept women in their place.” MenNeedsChildrenIdeasCharacterHomeMightMotherLeftWorkResponsibilityRolesVirtueFieldsRevolutionDevelopmentNeededMotherhoodExpertsShopsElsewhereSentimentalCultCharacter DevelopmentIndustrial RevolutionDomesticityKept Woman Author:Sandra Scarr
“In the early forties and fifties almost everybody "had about enough to live on," and young ladies dressed well on a hundred dollars a year. The daughters of the richest man in Boston were dressed with scrupulous plainness, and the wife and mother owned one brocade, which did service for several years. Display was considered vulgar. Now, alas! only Queen Victoria dares to go shabby.” MenYearsWellsEnoughYoungMotherWealthWifeFashionDaughterHundredDollarsDareQueensFortyDisplayVulgarAlasBostonVictoriaYoung LadiesShabbyWives And MothersPlainness Author:M. E. W. Sherwood
“Women are taught that their main goal in life is to serve others--first men, and later, children. This prescription leads to enormous problems, for it is supposed to be carried out as if women did not have needs of their own, as if one could serve others without simultaneously attending to one's own interests and desires. Carried to its "perfection," it produces the martyr syndrome or the smothering wife and mother.” IfsMenNeedsFirstsChildrenProblemLife IsMotherDesireWomenGoalInterestWifeProduceTaughtPerfectionEnormousSupposed To BeMartyrPrescriptionsLife GoalAttendingSyndromesWives And Mothers Book:Toward a New Psychology of Women Source: Toward a New Psychology of Women
“I was always moved by all of the music. As a young man, Duke Ellington and Lionel Hampton, Count Basie and all these great musicians would come through our town of Memphis. There wasn't adequate hotels, so these musicians - the lady who ran the theater knew my mother, who had a large house, and many of them would stay with us. So that was another great blessing, so I'm always around these great geniuses, and to realize their humanity is such a touching thing.” MenYoungMotherHumanityHouseRealizingGeniusBlessingMusicianTheaterTownsMovedRanYoung ManHotelTouchingAdequateGreat MusicDukesMemphisGreat MusicianOur TownHamptons Author:Charles Lloyd
“Navajo infants get so attached to cradleboard that they cry to be tied into it. Kikuyu infants in Kenya get handed around several"mothers," all wives to one man. . . . Mothers in rural Guatemala keep their infants quiet, in dark huts. Middle-class American mothers talk a blue streak at them. Israeli kibbutz mothers give them over to a communal caretaker . . . Japanese mothers sleep with them. . . . All these tactics are compatible with normal health--physical and mental--and development in infancy. So one lesson for parents so far seems to be: Let a hundred flowers bloom.” MenGivingSeemsMotherParentDarkSleepClassWifeMiddleCryFlowerDevelopmentLessonsQuietNormalHundredBlueMiddle ClassOne ManTiedInfantTacticsIsraeliInfancyKenyaCompatibleStreaksHutsBlooming FlowerCaretakersGuatemalaNew Parents Author:Melvin Konner