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In Lamb to the Slaughter is Mary Maloney a cold murderer or a victim of circumstances?

Mary is no victim. She is obviously a very resourceful and clever woman who was put in a very challenging situation. She may not be a victim, but her circumstances definitely made her react as if she were a cold blooded killer. In all, Mary would definitely be considered someone who could have become a victim of circumstances but, in a radical way, she chose not to become one. 


The epithet "cold blooded" has its origins in the way that psychologists approximate the behavior of psychopaths to that of someone who cannot be human-like. Since all of us are warm-blooded, a "cold blooded" individual would be, by definition, not normal; he or she is someone who stands out negatively. In the case of a psychopath, this cold blooded type of person has


  • no empathy, or ability to bond, sympathize, or connect with others

  • no conscience, or capacity to understand the rightness or wrongness in actions. 

  • no mercy; a psychopath will hurt anyone, at any given time, without any care in the world. Some of them do it for fun, while others feel it is a compulsion. The point is: They kill for NO reason. 

Mary Malone does not necessarily display psychopathic tendencies. In fact, she seems to have bonded quite well with her husband, appears to love him, and wishes to be subservient to him. She has no history of having hurt him before (that we know of), and she takes good care of her unborn child (aside from that pesky little habit of drinking whisky.)


Nevertheless, Mary is fine. She seems quite human. Moreover, she does have a reason to react the way that she did: Mary was terrified. Perhaps, she was even angry. 


When Patrick tells Mary that he will leave her, even though she is a good wife and is pregnant with their child, he does this in a way that is so cold and careless that it would be hard for any woman to process mentally. Moreover, we could always argue that Mary is pregnant, hormonal, and prone to reacting due to her heavy state. All of these variables: the shock, the pregnancy, the cruel news, the prospects of a life in near destitution, all collaborate to send her on a sudden hysteria. 


Therefore, Mary was just someone whose circumstances made her become something that she is not: a killer. 

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