I find it interesting that in “The Idiot Boy,” “The Thorn,” and “The Complaint” (and just from glancing at titles there is also “The Mad Mother” and “The Foster-Mother‘s Tale”) all describe mother-child relationships. The three different mothers show three different points on the maternal spectrum. Betty Foy is a mother who loves her simple son so much that she would abandon her dying friend to go find him. The Indian woman loves her child, but is forced to abandon him or her because she is too sick to keep up with the tribe. Then finally Martha Ray is suspect of murdering her child, making her something of an anti-mother.
The only thing Wordsworth emphasizes as often as maternal passion is pantheism and nature-worship. This suggests that Wordsworth holds the mother-child relationship in nearly equal regard with the man-nature relationship, which for Wordsworth, means it is very important. I’d be interested in seeing if there is some biographical information that would clue us in to Wordsworth's fascination with mothers. Or perhaps it will become clearer through reading more of his poems.
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