<b>Are Couples Really Happy after Divorce? An Analysis of the Negative Post-Divorce Effects in Hanif Kureishi’s Short Story Midnight All Day</b>
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.7596/taksad.v5i3.534Keywords:
Divorce, Negative Effects, Freedom, Romantic Love and IdentityAbstract
This paper examines the negative post-divorce effects on the separated couples in Hanif Kureishi’s short story Midnight All Day. In so doing, it focuses upon two negative aspects related to the post-divorce phases. First, it looks closely at how Kureishi’s fictional male character Ian feels frustrated, unhappy and fragmented in the wake of his divorce from his wife Jane, even though he finds at once a new lover Marina. Secondly, the paper also discusses another disturbing negative aspect of Ian’s life after the break-up with Jane – the negative aspect linked to his parental responsibility towards his daughter. The paper debates that Ian’s the situation is actually almost all the separated couples and their children in the contemporary world. He has a daughter, who stays with her grandmother in London. Whenever he sees a small girl in the street and whenever he thinks of her, he recalls at once his daughter and seems to suffer profoundly from the view that he is unable to fulfil his proper parental responsibility for her and be a good father, a good model for her emotional and social development as in a stable family.
References
Adams, G. R. (1982). The Effects of Divorce on Adolescents. The High School Journal, 65, 6, 205-211.
Ahrons, C. R. (2006). Introduction to the Special Issue on Divorce and Its Aftermath. Family Process, 46, 1, 3-6.
Allen, S. (2002). The Effects of Father Involvement: A Summary of the Research Evidence. Newsletter of the Father Involvement Initiative, 1, 2002, 1-11. Retrieved from http://www.ecdip.org/docs/pdf/IF%20Father%20Res%20Summary%20(KD).pdf
Amato, P. R. (2000). The Consequences of Divorce for Adults and Children. Journal of Marriage and Family, 62, 4, 1269-1287.
Amato, P. R. and Previti, D. (2003). People’s Reason for Divorcing: Gender, Social Class, the Life Course, and Adjustment. Journal of Family Issues, 24, 5, 602-626.
Amato, P. R. (2010). Research on Divorce: Continuing Trends and New Developments. Journal of Marriage and Family, 72, 3, 650-666.
Böheim, R. and Ermisch, J. (2001). Partnership dissolution in the UK - the role of economic circumstances. Oxford Bulletin of Economics and Statistics, 63, 197-208.
Bumpass, L. L., Martin, T. C. and Sweet, J. A. (1991). The impact of family background and early marital factors on marital disruption. Journal of Family Issues, 12, 22-42.
Chan, T. W. and Halpin, B. (2001). Children and marital instability in the UK. Mimeo. Department of Sociology: University of Oxford. Retrieved from http://www.demogr.mpg.de/Papers/workshops/010830_paper04.pdf
Cummings, E. M., and O’Reilly, A. W. (1997). Fathers and family context: Effects of marital quality onchild adjustment. In M. E. Lamb (Ed.), Th e role of fathers in child development (3rd ed.). New York, NY: John Wiley & Sons
Demo, D. H. and Acock, A. C. (1988). The Impact of Divorce on Children. Journal of Marriage and Family, 50, 3, pp. 619-648.
Dowling, E. and Gorell-Barness, G. (1999). Children of Divorcing Families: A Clinical Perspective. Clinical Child Psychology and Psychiatry, 4, 1, 39-50.
Gilbert, D. T., Pinel, E. C., Wilson, T. D., Blumberg, S. J. and Wheatley, T. (1998). Immune Neglect: A source of durability bias in affective forecasting. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 75, 617-638.
Glaeser, K. (2014). Threatening the Fabric of Our Society: Divorce in Modern Societies. Oglethorpe Journal of Undergraduate Research, 4, 1, 1-5. Retrieved from http://digitalcommons.kennesaw.edu/ojur/vol4/iss1/1
Hawkins, A. and Fackrell, T. (2009). Should I Keep Trying to Work It Out?: A Guidebook for Individuals and Couples at the Crossroads of Divorce (And Before). Retrieved from http://divorce.usu.edu/files/uploads/ShouldIKeepTryingtoWorkItOut.pdf
Hetherington, E. M., Cox, M. and Cox, R. (1976). Divorced father. Family Coordinator, 25, 417-428.
Hoem, J (1991). Trends and patterns in Swedish divorce risks 1971-1989, Stockholm University Research Reports in Demography No.64, Stockholm.
Kiernan, K. and Mueller, G. (1998). The divorced and who divorces? Working paper. London School of Economics: Centre for Analysis of Social Exclusion. Retrieved from http://eprints.lse.ac.uk/6529/1/The_Divorced_and_Who_Divorces.pdf
Kitson, G. C., Babri, K. B. and Roach, M. J. (1985). Who divorces and why: A review. Journal of Family Issues, 6, 255-293.
Kureishi, H. (2010). Collected Stories. London: Faber & Faber.
Lamb, M. E. (2002). Infant-father attachments and their impact on child development. In C. S. Tamis-LeMonda & N. Cabrera (Eds.), Handbook of father involvement: Multidisciplinary perspectives. Mahwah, NJ: Erlbaum.
Lynn, D. B. (1974). The Father: His Role in Child Development. Monterey, CA: Brooks/Cole.
Murphy, M. J. (1985). Demographic and socio-economic influences on recent British marital breakdown patterns. Population Studies, 39(3): 441.
Parish, T. S. and Taylor, J. C. (1979). The impact of divorce and subsequent father absence on children's and adolescent's self -concepts. Journal of Youth and Adolescence, 8, 427-432.
Pruett, K. (2000). Father-need. New York, NY: Broadway Books
Roberts, L. J. (2000). Fire and ice in marital communication: Hostile distancing behaviours as
predictors of marital distress. Journal of Marriage & the Family, 62, 693-707.
Rosenberg, J. and Wilcox, W. B. (2006). The Importance of Fathers in the Healthy Development of Children. This report was prepared by U.S. Department of Health and Human Services Administration for Children and Families Administration on Children, Youth and Families Children’s Bureau Office on Child Abuse and Neglect. Retrieved from https://www.childwelfare.gov/pubPDFs/fatherhood.pdf
Sternberg, K. J. (1997). Fathers, the missing parents in research on family violence. In M. E. Lamb (Ed.), Th e role of fathers in child development (3rd ed.). New York, NY: John Wiley & Sons.
White, L. (1991). Determinants of divorce: A review of research in the eighties. In A. Booth (Ed.), Contemporary families: Looking forward, looking back (pp. 141-149). Minneapolis, MN: National Council on Family Relations.
Wolfinger, N. H. (2003). Parental Divorce and Offspring Marriage: Early or Late?. Social Forces, 82, 1, 337-53.
Downloads
Published
How to Cite
Issue
Section
License
All papers licensed under Creative Commons 4.0 CC-BY.- Share — copy and redistribute the material in any medium or format
- Adapt — remix, transform, and build upon the material for any purpose, even commercially.
Under the following terms:
Attribution — You must give appropriate credit, provide a link to the license, and indicate if changes were made. You may do so in any reasonable manner, but not in any way that suggests the licensor endorses you or your use.
- No additional restrictions — You may not apply legal terms or technological measures that legally restrict others from doing anything the license permits.
