From: GRIFFISC at bcvms.bc.edu <GRIFFISC>
Date: Wed, 13 Sep 1995 08:33:14 -0400 (EDT)

HmmmYou've pinned me down once again, K.T.! As usual, your questions spur me on to think more carefully.

In Scorpions it seemed that Jamal needed his mother to physically and spiritually be ther for him---and she was neither because of the work she needed to do to get the money they needed to survive and because of the trauma of Randy's arrest, imprisonment and assault. She got some solace from religion (the part where the minister comes over and prays)
(and in the end they are on their way to church as a family) but that didn't seem to offer Jamal anything. I think Jamal might also have wanted some recognition of his efforts to solve the problem of Randy
(but once he gets the gun that all becomes clandestine.) It also seemed that Jamal's mother was giving mixed signals to him: suggesting he contact Mack (by passing on Randy's message) but also admonishing him to keep away from Mack. Jamal might have needed a clear signal of what to do.

I don't have as much to support the assertion with Fallen Angels--partly because we really only have Perry's impressions or thoughts about his mother. But it seems like she removed herself from him by alcoholism and that he, too, needed or wanted her to be there. We don't have as much information about the facts of her life though.

Susan
Received on Wed 13 Sep 1995 07:33:14 AM CDT