Oedipal themes aside, literature often uses the son’s departure from the mother as the true beginning of his "Hero's Journey." In , the emotional intimacy with his mother, Gertrude, is so profound that it cripples his ability to love other women. The book is a seminal look at how a mother’s unfulfilled dreams can be projected onto a son, turning his life into a proxy for her own.

Whether it is the haunting complexity of (exploring the trauma of maternal choice) or the quirky, co-dependent charm of About a Boy , the mother-son dynamic remains a central pillar of narrative. It represents our first encounter with "The Other"—the person who gives us life and, eventually, the person we must leave behind to find our own.

portrays a mother (played by Cher) fighting against discrimination to care for her ill son. : In Keisha Bush’s No Heaven for Good Boys