Unmaking Mary
Thoughts on perfect motherhood
Over Easter, I began reading Chine McDonald’s new book, Unmaking Mary and I’m relishing the beautiful blend of memoir, social history and meticulous theological commentary. Throughout Chine carefully deconstructs the myth of perfect motherhood, exploring the various expectations that are placed on our shoulders.
I’m not religious, unlike Chine, so it was somewhat surprising to realise just how much Catholic-imagery and cultural ideas of Mary had embedded themselves into my psyche when I became a parent myself. My paternal grandparents were Very Catholic and Christianity permeated our primary school in the 1980s/90s; of course Mary and motherhood had become synonymous in my mind.
Braiding her own experiences of motherhood with theological depth and generosity, this book allows us to take a divergent perspective on Mary, freeing her from the patriarchal mould in which she has been shaped by the Church, reinscribing mothering work with a sense of power, prestige and, for those minded to, divine possibility.
I will be discussing ideas raised in Chine’s work at the National Gallery on 23rd May, with Chine herself, plus writer and curator Catherine McCormack and artist and project curator Sharon Walters. The discussion will be chaired by Maryanne Saunders. It is free entry and more details can be found here.
If you can’t make it, you can listen to Chine discuss various aspects of motherhood with a range of thinkers, including me, on the Motherhood Versus the Machine podcast.
Below, I’m sharing some more fragments on Mary and motherhood from my drafts of MILK, some of which are beneath the paywall. Going forward, this kind of hybrid post where there is a ‘standalone’ introduction for all, followed by longer form writing for paid subscribers makes sense to me.
The mother archetype runs like a ribbon through our global histories, often linking the earth with the female-coded body, substances and spaces which are fertile and which tend to the seed (provided by the male). A non-exhaustive list would include: Gaia, one of the primordial Greek gods, is thought of as the embodiment of Earth. Jörð, whose name literally means ‘earth’ in Old Norse, was the mother of Thor and lover of Odin. In 1618 the German physician and alchemist Michael Maier published his Atalanta fugiens, which contains numerous illustrations by Matthias Merian, including a colour engraving which depicts Mother Nature as a nursing woman, her body the globe from which the baby suckles. As she walks through the landscape on strong legs, Jupiter suckles from a goat and Romulus and Remus suckle from the she-wolf.
The idea of an earth goddess or Mother Nature is revealing in the duality and complexity of mothering roles. As mother to all beings, Yoruba earth goddess Yemoja is a gentle nurturer, but she is also fiercely protective when necessary. This duality is also well-understood within the Hindu pantheon, where mothers are not meek. Durga (which translates as ‘invincible’) is the fierce, protective mother of the universe who rides a tiger with a weapon in each of her many hands. Kali, sometimes known as the Divine Mother, is often depicted standing atop a corpse wearing a garland of severed heads and wielding a sword.
Mothering is powerful and tender, strong and vulnerable, all in equal measure.