I often wonder why May-December affairs are a butt of ridicule. Anup Jalota’s putative love interest is 37 years his junior, Milind Soman’s wife is nearly three decades younger to him, Dilip Kumar is 22 years older than Saira Bano. The list is endless. Society is inured to age stereotypes and anything that disrupts this status quo is frowned upon. Roman emperor Cicero, who was a witness to Julius Caesar’s numerous dalliances and his endless philandering, chronicled that the Roman emperor was very liberal towards the age gap up and down, when he fell for a damsel or a woman. He was enamoured of women 30 – 35 years his senior and also slept with lasses much younger than his daughter. Agreed, one may say that when it comes to a casual fling or a one-night stand, age difference doesn’t matter. But it does matter in a relationship? No, it doesn’t.
All humans are terribly conditioned beings. ‘Though we’re born free, we’re chained by neurological conditioning of thousands of years. The evolutionary process, planted seeds of socio-psychological quotients that have percolated down to the ‘modern’ humans with almost no change,’ opined Adler, the contemporary of Freud and Jung.
These socio-psychological stereotypes or behavioural quotients engendered taboos of three types: Extreme, Intense and General. Incestuous relationships come under Extreme Taboos. Sexual relations outside a group or community fall under Intense Taboos (mind you, caste-type divisions of Indian social system were and are still prevalent in other parts of the world, albeit in different forms). Age related issues in relationships come under General Taboos.
So, castigating a May-December relationship is still a kind of a taboo, at least in India. Most of us are unaware of the dynamics of such a relationship which is based on Freudian Super-Ego (ID). When a relatively ‘old’ man falls for a very young and nubile lass, both subconsciously satisfy their Super-Ego. Man finds it the vindication and validation of his (waning) virility and the young woman finds it egoistically satisfying in the sensethat she has the grey cells and anatomical assets to lure a man for whom a (young) woman’s mental maturity also matters. That he fell for her, leaving women closer to his age bracket is immensely gratifying to a young woman’s prominent but fluid ego. Certain Freudian Electra Complex (a woman’s ‘fondness’ for her father or father-like men) also works insidiously.
Heart may have a role in a love-affair or a relationship, but it’s the human brain that plays all the tricks. Mind you, the reciprocal satisfaction of a man and woman’s ego is not always temporary. In many cases, it lasts for a long time. That’s why, the Hollywood genius Woody Allen’s marriage with his 35 years junior step-daughter still goes on after 21 years. We cannot be judgemental and we ought not to be.
Now in the reverse relationships or Oedipal liaisons between an older woman and a younger man, society is even more harsh. C B Northcote wrote in his magnum opus ‘Oedipus in his Other Relationships’ that only when a man-woman relation becomes age-unspecific, and woman assumes the role of a sub-conscious mother to the young man guiding him through the labyrinth of life, a greater and much deeper (often sans sexuality) bond is formed. Amrita Pritam and Imroz’s relationship was of that kind. Imroz was 19 years younger to Amrita. Roman poet Virgil fell for his friend’s mother who was 32 years his senior. They lived and died together. French president Macron’s wife Brigitte Macron is her husband’s ‘equilibrium’ in all respects and aspects. She’s 24 years senior to him and, coincidentally, the mother of Macron’s friend!
Love and age are dichotomous ideas. The one has nothing to do with the other. Age is a number and love is a free-wheeler. They have become entwined by the structures of society that demand that the man should be older than woman. Earlier, when age wasn’t so well set down, older women cohabiting with younger men was popular. On the thoroughfare of life, love enters everywhere. Neither age nor love can be confined. They flow free like all addictive energies.