The Rocking Horse Winner Misguided Love

In D.H. Lawrence’s short story, “The Rocking- Horse Winner” and James Joyce’s “Araby”, there are many similarities. In both stories, a young boy wants to give something to the women they love ends in a “tragedy”. Although these two stories are considerably different, they have the similar theme of misguided love. The two characters in the stories do things out of love but are misguided in the way to show it.
In the “The Rocking- Horse Winner”, Paul, the main character becomes obsessed with winning bets and making money. However, he does this out of love because he wants his mother’s attention and for her to be happy. Paul’s mother blames the concept of “luck” for her family’s low finances. Paul takes the concept of “luck” as something that can be achieved like money instead of something that comes by chance. His obsession with being lucky causes him to go mad to find the winning horse. His wish is to make his mother happy, but he doesn’t understand that she made her feel

In “The Rocking- Horse Winner”, Paul gains wealth to make his mother happy and in “Araby” the boy goes to the bazaar to buy his crush a gift. However, at the end of the story, both boys suffer from a “tragedy”. Paul dies from madness for trying to find the key to wealth, which causes him to go “down a terrible path to emotional and physical distress” (Watkins para.3). In “Araby” the boy creates an idea of love for his crush and promises her a gift. He ends up realizing that she doesn’t love him the way he loves her, and he feels frustrated for letting his fantasy distract him from what is important in his life. The two stories showed what most people see “love” as something that usually springs from vanity or the innate desire for the approval of others. Paul gives money to his mother to prove to her that he was lucky and the boy in “Araby” tries to impress his crush by getting her a