Fatherhood in the Forest

[tabouli.livejournal.com]

Reading through people's comments on the last post, I found myself musing on the fathers depicted in the Marlow series. Even though none of them play a major role, there's quite a range.

The omniabsent Commander Marlow seems the kind of father who sees putting an expensively framed cabinet portrait of the family in his room as a substitute for taking leave to see them (see also Nicola's preference for a photo of Giles' ship and Nelson over photos of her family members?), but otherwise appears a friendly, no-nonsense sort of fellow. You have to smile at his pragmatic military preference for Nicola's crew cut in Falconer's Lure.

Arguably the most negative depiction of a father in the series is Mr Hopkins. When Berenice proclaims Meg's tormented family life to the masses, Meg shifts from being a workaholic nonentity to a disturbing reflection of her father's abuse, reinforced by his brief, dour cameo near the end of The Cricket Term (in which Forest hints that he also abuses his wife). On the subject of pastoral care at Kingscote, it's faintly reassuring that the school did attempt to intervene on Meg's behalf, even though it didn't succeed.

Mr West is warm and engaging; Mr Merrick is wry and genial, and seems to have a pretty healthy relationship with his son, where Patrick respects the boundaries he sets and wants his approval without fearing him. Our fleeting glimpse of Mr Todd suggests to me a conservative pillar of community type who indulges and secretly enjoys the eccentricities of his wife. Then, of course, there's Edwin, who is the only father whose parenting we see centre stage in the series.

There was a very interesting discussion of Edwin on Girl's Own in 1998 or so, which revealed a divide among Forest fans. Some would have happily had him locked up for the riding crop scene; others agreed that this was appalling behaviour, but allowed him more leeway. He is certainly a stern and authoritarian parent, though when he see him he is under a lot of stress and seems used to being the disciplinarian half of the parental team: see Rose's appeal to Mrs Marlow when he pushes her to stop reading and go outside. I'm not sure what I think of him as a parent, but he's certainly an interesting and complex character.

What do other people think about Edwin, and Forest fathers in general?

Comments

[ankaret.livejournal.com]

Not, I hasten to add, that there's anything whatever wrong with not working outside the home, it's just that Mrs Merrick seems such an urban sophisticate type who would find other things more fulfilling.

[oursin.livejournal.com]

'Urban sophisticate' isn't necessarily at odds with the kind of good works I mentioned in my other post on this thread: she reminds me of some of Nanda's schoolmates in Antonia White's Frost in May, who are all rather uppercrust RCs, or their relatives at the Old Girls' Day.

[ankaret.livejournal.com]

No, that's quite true - I can see her chairing any number of committees. I think I meant 'if I was certain it wasn't mentioned anywhere in canon and I was writing Mrs Merrick I would probably give her a job, but as it is I strongly suspect it's mentioned somewhere in canon that she doesn't have a paid job'.

As far as the only-one-child thing goes, I think I assumed fertility problems which neither of the Merricks actually found that distressing. Though whilst I suspect Mr Merrick actually does follow the Church's teachings on contraception, I wouldn't be in any way surprised if Mrs Merrick had quietly taken steps to make sure there weren't any more, thank you.

[oursin.livejournal.com]

Oh, I wouldn't in the least be surprised at Mrs Merrick making sure she stopped at just the one! - it seems to fit with the rest of her character. And on the paid job thing, I think given the time when the first books in the sequence were written, she definitely wouldn't have had a paid job (though I can see her having been super-efficient at something or other during the War, when she had to).

[liadnan]

Bear in mind that Falconer's Lure was published well before Humanae Vitae when the Catholic position on contraception was much less clearly hard-line and formalised. And came as a shock and disappointment to many, particularly those in the developed world who'd cheerfully been taking steps for some time, and, it's generally thought, continued to do so.