Daddy Issues

“Married Love” is a story about Lottie, a young girl who falls in love with her professor who is forty five years her senior. By marrying and starting a family of her own, Lottie hopes to find some sort of meaning in her life. In the end, however, she does not find meaning nor does she find happiness. Tessa Hadley, the author of “Married Love,” is a professor at Bath Spa University College and teaches literature and creative writing. Throughout the story, Hadley uses simple vocabulary and straight-to-the-point sentences to show the ordinary nature of the family and of Lottie. The young girl does not in fact love her older professor, Edgar Lennox. She is using him to gain the love and support her own family failed to give her. In short, the girl has got Daddy Issues. Instead of trying to fix her relationship with her family, and primarily her Father, Lottie looks for an older man to take her father’s place and give her the love she feels she deserves. Piece of advice, honey, marrying the equivalent of a father-figure will not fix your life. The only thing that will is finding satisfaction in your own life through a passion such as music.