The Mother of a Traitor: mother's dilemma

In "The Mother of a Traitor" by Maxim Gorky, the mother's dilemma was a conflict between two duties: her love as a mother for her son, and her duty to her city and its people.

The dilemma

• Her son had become a traitor. He had joined the enemy and was leading its forces against his own native city.
• As a mother she loved him and could not easily think of harming him.
• As a citizen she knew that his army would bring death and destruction to the people of the city, including many mothers like herself.
• Whichever side she chose, she would lose something very dear: her son, or her city's trust and safety. Meanwhile the townspeople condemned her as "the mother of a traitor".

How she solved it

• She decided that the safety of the many outweighed the life of one, even her own child, and that a traitor should not be allowed to destroy his people.
• She went to the enemy camp where her son was and, as he slept, killed him with her own hand. This ended the threat to the city: "As a citizen I have done for my country all I could."
• She then honoured her duty as a mother as well. Saying "as a mother I remain with my son", she killed herself with the same knife.

Her solution is tragic but heroic: she put duty to her country above personal love, yet stayed faithful to her son, and in this way served both duties.