Why might Patrick have decided to leave his wife in "Lamb to the Slaughter"?
For some reason I always got the impression that Patrick left his wife for another woman. It was the first reaction as to why she would snap the way she did. Otherwise, I imagine that she would have tried to find a solution to the problem. To me, the shock must have been so profound that it literally moved the earth beneath her. Another thing that comes across clearly is Patrick's arrogance. Somehow he inspires dislike even before he did what he did. Perhaps is the hero-complex that often comes with working dangerous jobs like he did. However, between his arrogance, his lack of care, and perhaps with someone in the middle, he found no problem telling his wife off. But she got the last word ;)
We are not really told why Patrick Maloney would want to leave his wife so we can only guess. I think that the most...
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likely reason is that he is bored with her and that he wants someone who will be a bit less subservient and uninteresting.
From the first part of the story, it seems that the two of them have a pretty set routine. He comes home and then she waits on him -- gets him everything he wants, etc. She is content just to sit there and be with him and she seems to do so adoringly.
I know this sounds terrible, but I think that he has gotten bored with that. He wants someone who will treat him more like an equal. Maybe someone who will not just sit there and adore him. I think that he has started to take her for granted because their life has gotten so boringly consistent and because she always acts so much like a servant to him.
What might be Patrick's reason for ending his marriage in "Lamb to the Slaughter" and why isn't it revealed?
When Patrick arrives home from work, it quickly becomes clear that he is unhappy about something. He says that he feels tired, he drains his drink "in one swallow," and he speaks very abruptly to his wife. He tells her simply to "sit down" when she offers to refill his glass and replies with the monosyllabic "no" when she offers to get his slippers. He then pours himself another very strong drink and doesn't offer any reply at all when his wife tries to talk to him about his day at work.
Patrick then seems to tell his wife that their marriage is over, which we can infer when he tells her, "I'll give you money and see you're looked after." Dahl chooses not to disclose Patrick's reasons for leaving. There are, however, clues in the story that we might use to draw our own inferences. We might infer, for example, that when he told his wife earlier that he was tired, he was talking about his feelings about their marriage rather than the day he had at work. Thus, Patrick's reason for leaving his wife might simply be that he has grown tired of her. Another possible explanation is the prospect of a baby being introduced to the marriage. We are told at the beginning of the story that Patrick's wife is in her "sixth month with child." Perhaps the prospect of raising a child with his wife has frightened Patrick, and perhaps this is the reason he chooses to leave the marriage.
Dahl chooses not to disclose the reason or reasons behind Patrick's decision because by not doing so, he makes it more difficult for the reader to reach any neat conclusions as to the behavior of the wife. We perhaps hesitate to condemn the wife as much as we ordinarily might, because Dahl has left open the possibility that the husband said something truly dreadful to her. If we knew for certain the reason for Patrick's decision to leave, then it would perhaps be too easy to vilify the behavior of the wife. Indeed, the wife's behavior is really not excusable under any feasible circumstances, but Dahl leaves open the possibility that there might just be one circumstance, disclosed to her by her husband but not to us, under which it is.
Why did Patrick end his marriage in "Lamb to the Slaughter"?
There is no textual evidence to show why Patrick ends his marriage. He comes home from work and is cold and distant. This could be his usual manner or it could be an anomaly. The narrator notes that Mary "loved the warmth that came out of him when they were alone together." So, either he's being typically cold or he's being atypically cold. It isn't until he repeatedly tells her to sit down that she begins to think something is different.
After she finally sits down, he tells her that what he has to say will come as a shock. The next paragraph opens with him saying, "So there it is." Then he adds that he will give her money and that it won't be a big deal. The bottom line is that we don't know Patrick's motive to end the marriage. Maybe it is Mary who's been unfaithful. This would explain why he is so cold and why she is so attentive, as if she's making up for some mistake. Or, it could be that Patrick has been unfaithful. Again, if he has fallen in love with another woman, his detachment makes sense. And Mary, even though she's been cheated on, is acting out of desperation to keep their marriage together. Or, it could be some other scenario. There's no way to say for sure.
The author, Dahl, teases and coaxes the reader to look for clues, anything to shed light on the motive. This is fitting because the policemen who arrive to investigate Patrick's death are incompetent and they unwittingly eat the evidence. But just as Mary hides the evidence, Dahl leaves no evidence for the reader as to Patrick's motive.
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