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Katherine Mansfield's Miss Brill

501 Words3 Pages

Discuss the idea(s) developed by the text creator in your chosen text about the role self-perception plays when individuals seek to reconcile the conflict between illusion and reality? An individual’s view on the world can be set by reality or one’s own imagination, to find a sense of fondness to fill a void caused by loneliness and is faced with self-deception “Miss Brill” by Katherine Mansfield. Miss Brill is an old woman, who goes to the Jardins Publiques a park in France to watch people and the band play. Miss Brill places herself into the lives of others and makes up her own scenarios involving the individuals, calling herself an actress. However, Miss Brill faces the cruel reality of society when two individuals pester her and her appearance. …show more content…

Initially Miss Brill goes to the park to feel less lonely and more inclusive with people, by altering her reality. A series of events causes Miss Brill to feel lonelier and shatters the illusions she creates, inevitably facing her self-deception. As she was watching individuals at the park, one woman wearing a fur coat comes across and meets a man smoking a cigarette. He does acknowledge her presences or of what she is saying as stated “he shook his head, lighted a cigarette, slowly breathed a great deep puff into her face, and, even while she was still talking and laughing, flicked the match away and walked on” (p.59). Furthermore she states that the elderly people at the park are “odd, silent, nearly all old, and from the way they stared they looked as though they’d just come from dark little rooms, or even cupboards” (p. 59) though Miss Brill does not realize that she is also speaking for herself. A young couple takes a seat beside her and teases Miss Brill, stating that she is a “stupid old thing” (p.61) and that her fur coat, something she cherished, is “fried whiting” (p.61). These remarks make Miss Brill realize that she is nothing, and not an actress but rather an old woman who comes to the park to feel some sort of reliance and dependence by the people around her. Miss Brill is negatively affected and is forced to comprehend that she is neither integral nor important. She is nothing to

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Miss Brill, a lovely respectable women who lives in a perfect world or so we thought. Miss Brill seemed to be a happy being, who as though was a cheerful optimist, didn 't see the sadness of herself but she did of others. In the text ‘Miss Brill’ written by Katherine Mansfield, Miss Brill feels as if she appears to be wanted by others, but only plays a part in a fantasy world. The reality is, she is not wanted and is just a lonely old women. The author shows the difference between appearance and reality by using a range of language features to show that Miss Brill has her idea of herself as a fantasy and the way that near the end, reality hits her.

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Katherine Mansfield, born in New Zealand and attended Queen’s College at the age of nineteen, in her short story, “Miss Brill”, published in 1922, writes about a middle-aged women who experiences a dramatic moment at a park she frequently visits that defines her realty. The author supports her four main themes of: loneliness, youth, reality and delusion by describing moments of judgement, curiosity, imaginative, and optimistic from the protagonist, Miss Brill. Mansfield’s purpose is to illustrate the revelation to Miss Brill, destruction of her universal illusion, and to bring forth the “cupboard” symbol of her loneliness and shame into reality. She establishes a calm and formal tone for her audience, the readers of “Miss Brill”.

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By Irodakhon Abirazakova “Miss Brill” is a short fictional story which was written by Katherine Mansfield in 1922. Personally I don’t really like this story, because it is very confusing and very hard to know what is going to happened, and what is going on this story. Miss Brill is a main character of this story, which is a little bit in mind. She is also the most faced character, the narrator describes her with different sides, which helps us to see her several sides of her nature. She is described as an old woman who lives in a small flat.

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