Mothers in D&D | Moms in Myth | Wandering DMs S06 E16
This Mother’s Day, Paul and Dan discuss the role of mothers in D&D and mythology. From troll wives to Grendel’s mother to the spawn of all monsters, Tiamat herself, moms make an impact in our lives!
Throughout history, mothers have been depicted in a variety of art works, including paintings, sculptures and written texts, that have helped define the cultural meaning of ‘mother’, as well as ideals and taboos of motherhood.
The institution of motherhood in western art is often depicted through “the myth of the all-loving, all-forgiving and all-sacrificing mother” and related ideals. Examples include works featuring the Virgin Mary, an archetypal mother and a key historical basis for depictions of mothers in western art from the European Renaissance onwards. Mothers depicted in dominant art works are also primarily white, heterosexual, middle class and young or attractive.
These ideals of motherhood have been challenged by artists with lived experience as mothers. An example in western contemporary art is Mary Kelly’s Post-Partum Document. Bypassing typical themes of tenderness or nostalgia, this work documents in extensive detail the challenges, complexities and day-to-day realities of the mother-child relationship. Other artists have addressed similar aspects of motherhood that fall outside dominant ideals, including maternal ambivalence, desire, and the pursuit of self-fulfillment.
This description uses material from the Wikipedia article “Mother“, which is released under the Creative Commons Attribution-Share-Alike License 3.0.
