‘Do you want me to seduce you?’
— Mrs Robinson, The Graduate
What is it about older women that get the guys hooked on to them? Mrs Robinson, from the 1967 American movie, The Graduate, is a part of most young men’s history. At some point of time in his life, a man feels magically drawn to a certain Mrs Robinson. The older woman enchants him, her self-assurance and confidence fascinate him. For some guys, the impact of this enchantress is so great that even after they are well into their youth and surrounded by pretty and young girls, the lure of the older woman remains intact. They find the demands of the Pretty Young Thing (P.Y.T.) irritating and unnecessary. They would rather spend time exploring this woman who has a lot of experience and can teach them a thing or two about life and the mystery called woman, in particular.
For all practical purposes, these relationships are mostly short-lived, but their impact is everlasting. It seems like you can’t possibly graduate in the school of life without the help of a Mrs Robinson.
‘Old as she was, she still missed her daddy
sometimes.’
— Gloria Naylor
Just as a young man admires an older woman, young women, too, have a thing for older men. Their need is linked to their emotions. A woman looks for a father figure to compensate for the stability and security that she may have lacked while growing up. She wants to be able to look up to this man as he takes charge of the situation at hand.
‘The fear, the great cold fear of the base-
born, her father, everything human and
swarming. Like a great bog humanity
swamped her, and she sank in, weak at
the knees, filled with repulsion and fear of
every person she met.’
— D.H Lawrence,
The Virgin and the Gypsy
Then there are women who categorically reject anyone who shows traits like their father. A woman who has not only seen her mother suffer at the hands of her father but has also witnessed the family disintegrate, looks for the exact opposite of what her father was. These women feel emotionally battered and, usually, grow up with a distorted notion of a man which they tend to generalise. If the man they are dating bears any sort of similarity with their father, they tend to take a step back.
‘Passive, she would have been accused of
being a burden; active, she was suspected
of wanting to boss the household.’
— Jean-Paul Sartre, The Words
Ideally, Sons and Lovers by D.H. Lawrence should have had a subtitle and should have read—Sons and Lovers: An Indian Story. But the fact that it is an English novel proves that it is a universal syndrome. East or West, mothers will be mothers. Not all women can cope with being relegated to a secondary position in the life of her perfect man—her son. Once she realises that her existence has no impact on the life of her husband, her son becomes the repository of all her affections. She glorifies her sacrifices and injects in him the feeling of being her only hope to live for. He enjoys playing the role of her saviour and lives according to her wishes.
But once he gets married and his attention gets divided between his wife and mother, she becomes livid. She feels that this new woman in his life is undeserving of her son’s love and affection. According to her, she was the one who sacrificed her best years to raise him and it is the other woman who gets to reap the rewards just because she satisfies his needs. She doesn’t miss a chance to project her daughter-in-law in a bad light so that her son pays more attention to her than his wife.
Likewise, there are women who do the same to their mothers-in-law. They pretend to be harassed by them so that they can live independently in another house. They see them as a competitor and find their mother-in-law’s holier-than-thou image in the eyes of their husbands annoying. They also dislike any interference in their way of running the household, even if it is for their own good.
Yet, men may be able to solve the gravest issues like world peace, travelling to other planets, designing nuclear weapons, surviving great wars, but when it comes to these two women at war, they throw in the towel.