Purpose, Themes and Conflicts
“Happy families are all alike; every unhappy family is unhappy in its own way.” Leo Tolstoy’s opening of Anna Karenina.
Universal themes are embedded in all families. When a couple unites, starts a family, grows, and ages, conflicts develop. How conflicts manifest themselves and become resolved or unresolved are unique in each family. I want to explore universal family themes and how they were uniquely manifested in the Wills family. In the post section of this site, I’ll try to answer my own questions about individuals and ancestors who struggled with the conflicts that ensued and how they tried to resolve them one hundred years ago.
Here are some of the universal themes that broadly affected the Wills Family:
Independence and self-sustaining versus dependency as manifested in leaving home & homeland, emigration, family cohesiveness versus separation.
Social class in 19th century America, working class poverty, labor, economics.
Immigration and cultural adaptation in 19th and 20th century America.
Religious zealotry and religious intolerance manifested in a Protestant- Roman Catholic tension pervasive in 19th and early 20th centuries in USA. The single-mindedness of adults caught in religious frameworks established in religious orthodoxy and the bible.
And here are the unique conflicts that greatly affected individuals in the Wills family:
Disinheritance, abandonment, detachment, social isolation versus engagement
Alcohol Addiction
Depression, Loss of self-identity, loss of purpose
Loss of family through death and disinheritance
Family Disintegration, children of alcoholics,
and there is more but this list is already more than this writer can hope to think about.
