A mother’s unconditional care for her abandoner overrides even the threat of death

Evidence

“My son,” she said gently, “I am marking the path — so that after you leave me, you will be able to find your way safely back down the mountain in the dark, and not become lost.” … When the young farmer heard this — that even now, even as he was carrying her to her death, his mother thought only of HIS safety — he could not bear it. He could not abandon her. Instead, he secretly carried her back home and hid her in a concealed cellar beneath the house, where he cared for her in secret, against the law. — , A Year of World Stories, 8422

Categorization

• XREF: The selfless-mother detail connects to the ubasute debates and to the reader’s work on how tales encode a culture’s stance on the elderly. — connects to: Extreme circumstances can force survivors to abandon their former morals; A child resolved an impossible parental dilemma by eliminating the threat — Farrar, Straus and Giroux Ishmael Beah, A Long Way Gone- Memoirs of a Boy…, 868; Perpetua deliberately chose death over life with her son — , The Rod and the Child: A Global History…, 2192 (+2 more)
• FICTION: The psychological gut-punch of a gesture meant to protect the one causing the harm is a reusable story engine.

Related

• Perpetua deliberately chose death over life with her son (similarity 0.81)

Broader Connections

• Perpetua deliberately chose death over life with her son #contradicts (0.85) — , The Rod and the Child, 2192
• Extreme circumstances can force survivors to abandon their former morals #exemplifies (0.75)
• A child resolved an impossible parental dilemma by eliminating the threat #contradicts (0.60) — Farrar, Straus and Giroux Ishmael Beah, A Long Way Gone- Memoirs of a Boy…, 868
• Gazing at a dead parent’s face feels like violation yet demands continuation #qualifies (0.50) — Karl Ove Knausgaard, A Death in the Family, 1210