Katherine Mansfield’s short story Essay

Katherine Mansfield’s short story â€Å"Miss Brill† is the story of a woman who is lonely and isolated from the world around her although she tries to make herself believe that she belongs to the community and is connected to the rest of the people who live in her little world. This theme of loneliness and isolation and Miss Brill’s attempts to waive them away would recur many times throughout the plot. Miss Brill is an old maid and that in itself makes her an outsider in a society that believes that being married is the norm rather than the exception. Every Sunday afternoon she visits the park and spends the entire time looking at the people and delighting in the activity going on. She compares herself to an audience watching a play unfolding before her. However, by regarding the world around her as a stage, she is unconsciously referring to her own life as another plot in a make-believe play of life. She is a lonely woman pretending that everything is fine with her life as much as everything looks fine with everyone during that afternoon in the park. While walking, with her ermine fur around her shoulders, she â€Å"breathed something light† which she denies as â€Å"sadness†. When she listens to the band playing, she feels a certain â€Å"chill† that she insists is not â€Å"sadness†. Her ultimate denial happens when she comes home after having eavesdropped upon a young couple making fun of her. While she replaces the fur in its box, â€Å"she heard something crying. † Every time, Miss Brill waives away the pangs of loneliness so that she is even able to pretend that the crying comes from inside the fur box. But at every instance of denial, her sadness and isolation only becomes more obvious to the reader. Work Cited Mansfield, Katherine. Miss Brill.