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Essay / The theme of loneliness in "Miss Brill" by Katherine Mansfield
Table of contentsThe life of Miss Brill as a representation of the key themeWhen the main part of the story beginsWorks CitedThe central theme of the short play Miss Brill by Katherine Mansfield is the pain of loneliness and the undeniable attempts lonely people make to live their lives vicariously and insidiously through others and the environment around them. Rather than finding companionship through interaction with others, the lonely among us discover fulfillment by experiencing the pleasures of life through others. A combination of circumstances and misfortunes from the time Miss Brill was born leads the English teacher to a solitary existence outside of school hours. To the point of admitting that she is uncomfortable even revealing to her own students how she spends her time on weekends. The staging created by the author is essential, the ironic beauty of an autumn day as the life around it begins to show the first signs of death and retiring for the cold months. Say no to plagiarism. Get a tailor-made essay on “Why Violent Video Games Should Not Be Banned”? Get the original essayThe Life of Miss Brill as a Representation of the Key ThemeMiss Brill's loneliness is a reflection of the times, the years leading up to and around the 1920s were not easy for women, the lack of respect was still absolutely there. Traditionalist views still raged and women were very oppressed in this society. Miss Brill, as a supposedly single woman, could not live her life in freedom at all. The harsh foot of oppression was one of the main reasons why Miss Brill adopted her way of living vicariously through others. Society limited her opportunities to flourish through her own life and environment by restricting what she could and could not do via social norms. Miss Brill's theory of the world and each of its members being part of an elaborate stage production offers a rationalization for how she spends her life. She is frustrated with her job and her theory allows her to imagine that even though she reads to him while he ignores her, she is at the same time part of something bigger than herself. Miss Brill's delusion becomes more apparent to the reader as she has these self-justifying and self-protective thoughts, which she does not recognize as being self-justifying or self-protective. Miss Brill is imaginative and optimistic about the way she sees the world. Even though she has only spoken to her fur coat in the story so far, her idea of a kind of universal game shows her feeling of deep connection between all human beings. And it also asserts its own essential character in this world: if the whole world is a play, then every actor is important, is essential to the stage. The way Miss Brill talks to her coat—a decidedly strange thing to do—suggests to the reader that she might be crazy. Yet the precision of her observations quickly shows that she's not actually crazy, while the details about taking her coat out of storage and "giving it life" clearly also refer to Miss Brill herself . It then becomes clear that Miss Brill is someone who has been in a sort of “storage” herself – who is intensely alone and lonely – and these outings to the park are what “give her life”. However, her loneliness does not seem entirely obvious to her, and she seems to intensely love this outing to the park, and to feel a kind of power in her connection with what is happening. Although it is truly surprising that she, 31(3), 17-18.