What do you think of Lucy saying she fell in love with William because he projected authority?

Lucy claims she fell in love with William because he projected authority. "We crave authority," she goes on. "No matter what anyone says, we crave that sense of authority. Of believing that in the presence of this person we are safe." What is your take on this statement? Do you agree with it?

Later, after he shaves off his mustache, she says his authority was no longer present, and that he was no longer the person who made her feel safe. Why do you think that was?

Lucy felt safe when she thought William had authority. She grown up with such insecurity that to think she'd finally found it, of course that made her love him. As far as the mustache, without it he perhaps seemed a more normal person to her.

I feel Lucy craved authority because she associated it with being protected and safe, probably because of her dysfunctional childhood.
As far as Williams missing mustache making him seem less authoritative to Lucy, maybe because he looked younger, less distinctive?

We're attracted to heroes, and whatever constituted William a hero to Lucy, which I guess was his mustache, gave him, in her mind, the authority (protector) she was looking for. Hard to believe that the removal of that mustache could change that perspective for her in that moment, because after all the years of knowing him, I would have thought she would have realized that sooner, like when he started having affairs...because at that point, he certainly was not her protector.

Lucy was in need of a protector. Someone who could look after her and care for her after the trauma of her childhood. William was there at the right time and he came with a mother figure, something Lucy never had. I doubt the mustache had anything to do with him being an authority figure. At this point in Lucy's life. she had raised two children, had a second marriage and had endured the loss of her husband. She had matured to the point of not needing an authority figure, just a good friend.

Earlier in her life Lucy needed that sense of security. She attributed it with the mustache as a symbol. At the end, I sensed that she was comfortable with herself, that she was secured in her knowing of herself.

I think she was wrong. This is one of the most compelling plot points of the novel, that what Lucy believes to be true often is not. William was always unreliable, and his authority seems to have been tempered with a great deal of ambiguity. I believe she fell in love with him because he was in love with her, and she had believed herself unlovable. I don't doubt that his authority, perhaps even an unconscious affirmation of the rather unflattering desire for male authority, played a part. But William doesn't really exude the kind of authority she seemed to crave. It is also worth remembering that in Hansel and Gretel, the fairy tale version of their relationship Lucy invokes, it is Gretel, not Hansel, who saves them.

Lucy met William at a very vulnerable time. She was so young and in unfamiliar surroundings. I think she was attracted to his appearance of authority and felt safe with him at that time. I imagine that his infidelities shattered her feelings of being safe. Also, at the end of the book, she discovered that he was not secure in his life’s work. He felt that he had not had a distinguished career like others had. He seemed to be unraveling.