Family Disintegration in Daniel Defoe’s Moll Flanders
Family disintegration causes the children to live in a constant state of turmoil, as the continuous absence of the father or the mother or both makes the children lose safety. Many studies refer to this problem as a modern problem that began to spread in societies in the modern era, and attribute it to the evolution in societies, while in his Moll Flanders (1722), the English novelist Daniel Defoe (1660 – 1731) had given a sample for such a problem, as he embarked on a mission to explore the essence of it; tracing at the same time the consequences that would later on result from it. The novelist let Moll (his protagonist) tell her own story; referring to her family background that led to her social delinquency. The study follows the analytical approach for studying the causes of the problem, stating the results reached by the research, in terms of indicating the essential role of parents in shaping the individual’s personality, as well as stating the recommendations made by the researcher.
Keywords: Family disintegration; Daniel Defoe; Moll Flanders; child delinquency; female delinquency
