so you know how there is this trope of a female character seeing a male character as a substitute to her father (daddy issues and all) or a male character seeing his love interest as his mother (freud stuff)?
i was wondering if there is something that short of reverses this dynamic in a weird way - a female character being reminded of her mother by a male character, or preceiving him as a substitute to a motherly figure or something like that.
i know it’s very specific and kind of twisted, but literature is full of specifically twisted tropes, yet i can’t think of any example for something like that. does anything come to mind?
This does sound pretty compelling. You may have more luck on genre romance subreddits, they’re very into niche, twisted dynamics. I’d be surprised if it’s not out there.
I wish I could help, this is interesting. Can you even think of any male “mother figures” in fiction, just the basic concept without the more specific romance dynamic? It seems like a fascinating thought experiment that some author should have wanted to examine before. I can’t think of any examples even of the basic concept, but it’s possible that I have read male mother figures in books and just didn’t register or remember them as such. I guess the only way to do it (without gender stereotyping like “he’s warm and not stern so he’s more motherly than fatherly”) would be having him remind a specific character of her specific mother, or her specific subjective idea of mothers.