Sons and Lovers; by DH Lawrence.

This belongs to an era when women still had little choices and had rarely any control over their persona or their lives, and frequently little in way of any connection with the men in their lives - husbands, that is - except being used in carnal way, and receiving what sustenance was provided to maintain the home and children.

Many - many more than otherwise - women still have such lives, fairy tales of love or not.

When such women are well to do due to the wealth of the husband or otherwise inheritance, it is another story, with perhaps other women in similar circumstances for company. But a woman who is also poor - she has only one hope for a secure connection and an ultimate security or emotional and otherwise sort, and any chance of an ascendence to power at all, and that is with her sons. If she is fortunate enough that not only she is emotionally connected to them but they are connected to her as well, then she is secure, free of worry, they will fulfill the needs their fathers left unsatisfied - which is, every other but carnal.

And yet, there is the one person (per son) who can threaten this bond - the woman who awakens love in the heart, not merely the nether region, of the son. The latter can be managed, will be manageable. The former is a formidable competition, and too an opponent. There is no tolerating her when the mother needs her son dependent on her emotionally, seeing her as the epitome of womanhood as he always has done while he grew up. That love cannot be allowed.

Some sons escape, and some are caught, their lives thrown in directions they did not necessarily aspire to.