Multiple instances and wrong parental links

Sat Jan 1 20:59:33 EST 2011

I have hit yet another wall. I am dynamically creating a class and then creating instances of that class. The class relies on a second class to store a list of objects. (This is simplified from the the original by a factor of about 20. The real program is trying to create a Python object around an XML definition object.)
Here's the code:
## OPTION ONE for class: ElementList
### Not really a list, but a wrapper that behaves like a list
class ElementList(object):
 def __init__(self, parent, name):
 self._parent = parent
 self._name = name
def MakeWrapper(checker, _addNameAsAttribute = False ):
 ## OPTION TWO for class: ElementList
 class Wrap(object):
 ## OPTION THREE for class: Elementlist
 def __init__(self, name):
 self._name = name
 setattr(Wrap, 'stuff', ElementList(self, 'test'))
 Wrap.__name__= checker.title()
 return Wrap
if __name__ == '__main__':
 Dude = MakeWrapper('Dude')
 print Dude
 d1 = Dude('Josh')
 print d1, d1.stuff
 # creating the second instance changes the behavior of the subclass
 d2 = Dude('Ben')
 print d2, d2.stuff
 print d1.stuff._parent
 print d2.stuff._parent
 #creating a third instance changes the behavior of all the subclasses
 d3 = Dude('David')
 print d3, d3.stuff
 print d1.stuff._parent, d2.stuff._parent, d3.stuff._parent
## END CODE
And here is the output:
>>><class '__main__.Dude'>
<__main__.Dude object at 0x00DFB930> <__main__.ElementList object at 0x00DFB950>
<__main__.Dude object at 0x00DFB730> <__main__.ElementList object at 0x00DFB770>
<__main__.Dude object at 0x00DFB730>
<__main__.Dude object at 0x00DFB730>
<__main__.Dude object at 0x00DFB870> <__main__.ElementList object at 0x00DFB9B0>
<__main__.Dude object at 0x00DFB870> <__main__.Dude object at 0x00DFB870> <__main__.Dude object at 0x00DFB870>
The 'stuff' attribute is an ElementList object linked back to the parent instance, but every time I create an instance, every instance's 'stuff' links back to the last instance created.
I'm not sure why this is happening, or how to prevent it.
Any suggestions?