Miss Brill’s Fantasy vs. Reality
In Katherine Mansfield’s short story “Miss Brill” (rpt. In Greg Johnson and Thomas R. Arp. Perrine’s Literature: Structure, Sound, and Sense, 12th ed. [Boston: Wadsworth, 2015] 155-158), the protagonist, Miss Brill, lives a very lonesome life. Miss Brill is filled with joy by the most simple tasks of everyday living. She enjoys dramatizing and fantasizing the world around her to block out her loneliness. However, Miss Brill believes her fantasy is reality, especially while she is pampering her fur coat, visiting the park, and reading to the old man.
Miss Brill spent her sunday afternoons sitting on a park bench observing the world around her. She would fantasize about the people walking by her. For example, Miss Brill did not know “whether to admire” the young lady that threw the violets away “as if they’d been poisoned” after the little boy gave the flowers back to her (Mansfield 156). Miss Brill thought the young lady had been rude when she threw the flowers away. In reality, the woman might have been allergic to the flowers or was reminded of a sad time in her life when she saw them. Instead of Miss Brill considering the more realistic reasons for the flowers to be thrown away, she jumped immediately to her fantasy and decided the young lady threw away …show more content…
As she unboxes her beloved coat, she begins to personify it by “rubbing the life back into its dim little eyes” (Mansfield 155). Miss Brill also beings to hear the coat talk as if were truly alive. She believes the fur coat is very stylish and young. In reality, the fur coat is very worn, and covered in a dusting of moth powder. It does not look appealing to a young couple and it is compare to fried whiting. This description of the coat shakes Miss Brill into reality quickly; she now realizes the world around her is very different than how she views
In Katherine Mansfield’s short story “Miss Brill” (rpt. In Greg Johnson and Thomas R. Arp. Perrine’s Literature: Structure, Sound, and Sense, 12th ed. [Boston: Wadsworth, 2015] 155-158), the protagonist, Miss Brill, lives a very lonesome life. Miss Brill is filled with joy by the most simple tasks of everyday living. She enjoys dramatizing and fantasizing the world around her to block out her loneliness. However, Miss Brill believes her fantasy is reality, especially while she is pampering her fur coat, visiting the park, and reading to the old man.
Miss Brill spent her sunday afternoons sitting on a park bench observing the world around her. She would fantasize about the people walking by her. For example, Miss Brill did not know “whether to admire” the young lady that threw the violets away “as if they’d been poisoned” after the little boy gave the flowers back to her (Mansfield 156). Miss Brill thought the young lady had been rude when she threw the flowers away. In reality, the woman might have been allergic to the flowers or was reminded of a sad time in her life when she saw them. Instead of Miss Brill considering the more realistic reasons for the flowers to be thrown away, she jumped immediately to her fantasy and decided the young lady threw away …show more content…
As she unboxes her beloved coat, she begins to personify it by “rubbing the life back into its dim little eyes” (Mansfield 155). Miss Brill also beings to hear the coat talk as if were truly alive. She believes the fur coat is very stylish and young. In reality, the fur coat is very worn, and covered in a dusting of moth powder. It does not look appealing to a young couple and it is compare to fried whiting. This description of the coat shakes Miss Brill into reality quickly; she now realizes the world around her is very different than how she views