Emotional Enmeshment and Substitute Characters in D. H. Lawrence’s Sons and Lovers: A Family System and Attachment Theory Perspectives - Rumana Chowdhury & Shahnaz Parvin

In many studies of D. H. Lawrence’s Sons and Lovers, Freudian interpretations, particularly the Oedipus Complex, are applied to the characters and their relationships. However, the novel portrays how emotional enmeshment reshapes intimate relationships and preserves certain character replacements and substitutes, with marital dysfunction as a major issue. Gertrude Morel is the novel’s central character, whose emotional reliance on her sons displaces conjugal dissatisfaction, producing distorted familial boundaries and fostering dependency structures. Drawing on qualitative research, the study seeks to identify the writer's view that upholds the picture of the industrial and class tensions of early twentieth-century Nottinghamshire. The clash between Gertrude’s intellectual and Puritan heritage and Moral’s working-class sensuousness worsens emotional starvation and deepens maternal attachment. The study is grounded in Dr Murray Bowen’s (1950) Family Systems Theory (FST) and in Attachment Theory, as articulated by Janusz Koeczak (1878-1941). The study aims to reveal how emotional enmeshment alters intimate relationships and preserves certain character replacements and substitutes. Keywords: Emotional enmeshment, Substitution, Replacement, Marital dysfunction