Mothers-in-law in Literature
Although I complain about my mother-in-law a lot, I have to say that she is nowhere near as trying as Mimi, the mother-in-law in Jennifer Weiner's Little Earthquakes, the book I finished this morning. (Jet lag had the kids up at 2AM!) Mimi shows up at her only son's wedding in a wedding gown and defies her daughter-in-law at every turn. Nor is she as bad as the Japanese mother-in-law in Meera Chand's The Bonsai or the one in my own story, "Gan," which appears in Literary Mama: Reading for the Maternally Inclined. And I suppose I should point out that she has served as my muse on more than one occasion. I guess a little conflict is good for the writing.
posted by Gaijin Mama at 2:15 PM
2 Comments:
Hmm, my MIL has been visiting for almost a month now, and as difficult as it can be, at least she has been helping out a lot. Though I won't mind when she leaves next week, either (especially since Pedro will be back in school, finally...). I must say that I can only imagine what it would be like to live so close (and so boundary-less) to a MIL...
And I just got my copy of the LM anthology tody. It was nice to see your story there!
What I actually agreed to, after ten years of resistance, was living next door to my mother-in-law, not with her. As it turned out, her little house is connected to ours (her former abode) by a corridor. There are no locks in between, so she pops over every time she thinks of something to say to me. It can be very aggravating.
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