Miss Brill and You'Re Ugly Too

I mean, I am smart and funny, and I know I’m a good person. But this is high school, and nobody seems to care about that. Why couldn’t I be tall and elegant like Diondra, or have Judianne’s perfect complexion, all smooth, super-rich fudge? Better yet, why couldn’t I look like Tanisha, or Gloria?” (Grimes 46). This showcases inner conflict as Janelle’s character is shown insecure about her physical appearance. Even though Janelle is aware of her good qualities, she makes her physical appearance overshadow them. Janelle compares herself to others which make it hard for her to embrace herself and realize her self worth. This tells the reader how society is so attentive to the outer beauty of a person, that one isn’t giving importance to the inner qualities of themselves. On the other hand this is evident in Freedom Writers when Andre Bryant who is characterized as a tough and aggressive guy, agrees to a failing mark in Mrs. Erin Gruwell’s class. When asked why he did not try he says “It's what I feel I deserve, that's all” (LaGravenese). This made Mrs. Gruwell question this behaviour and tried to consult him by insuring that he can do it. This

After Pollock graduated, she went back to her middle school and saw all the sad kids. She felt emotional by seeing her own reflection, saying: “I wasn’t surprised to find my younger self crying at the back of this or that classroom, or starting up at some adult whose behavior had left me baffled, or wandering the gloomy stairwells, wondering if I would ever find my way out to a sunnier, less confusing, less confining life outside.” (113) I feel

Moreover, Daisy is also physically isolated from others. This can be evidenced when she asks Nick “do they miss me?” (15). Nick has just recently arrived in West Egg, so Daisy and Tom have invited him over for lunch at their house. Upon hearing that Nick had taken a stop in Chicago on his way East, Daisy asks this question of those who she knew when she lived there. This quotation demonstrates Daisy’s physical separation from her friends and family, and her lack of contact with those whom she cares about. Thus, Fitzgerald’s efforts to bash women is apparent in his treatment of Daisy’s social isolation, due to the fact that, although isolation can be the cause of many serious psychological traumas, Fitzgerald instead decides to manipulate it in order to illustrate her as a character who is shallow, and obsessed with her reputation. Hence, psychological and physical segregation is used to belittle both Myrtle and Daisy in the

Each of the students in Ms. Gruwell class faces their own personal troubles; Eva Benitez

Miss Brill and Sandra are both alienated by their community, but they do not seem to do much about it. Sandra seems to be isolating others instead of the other way around. During her own party, she “[refuses] to allow [people] into her kitchen”. She believes other people are strange and avoids them. Miss Brill also goes through a similar experience. She goes to a park because she “always looked forward to [listening] to [other] conversation”. She is lonely

In //Ethan Frome// Edith Wharton uses Mattie and Zeena as foil pairs to illustrate the inevitability of isolation corrupting and embittering the victims of its hold. Mattie and Zeena both start out as kind and thoughtful individuals, but as they are forced into isolation on the farm, they inevitably end up becoming unbearable hags despite their previous energy. Both Zeena and Mattie initially arrive energetically as help for Ethan because the primary woman of the house is ill before Ethan falls in love with them. Originally, Zeena is kindly and able to "understand [Ethan's] case at a glance" (29) just as Mattie also came "without a sign of discontent escap[ing] her" (25) regardless of having to deal with the hard life. Wharton sets up Mattie and Zeena's pasts as almost identical to first establish that they both were equally thoughtful before they became trapped in Starkfield; however, Zeena realizes after marrying Ethan and becoming imprisoned on the farm that she cannot leave, but rather is now a captive of the farm's isolation. Once Zeena has married Ethan, they had originally planned on selling the farm and abandoning it, but after the farm proved to be unsalable, Zeena found "life on an isolated farm was not what she had expected" and soon afterwards "developed the 'sickliness'" that is depression from the isolation of the Starkfield farm (30). Despite Zeena's

Loneliness and exclusion from society hurts and affects everyone; the emotional strain a person endures from it creates the image they present to others, but deep down they are not the display image they manufacture. As an illustration, while opening up to Lennie in the barn Curley’s wife states, “I get lonely… You can talk to people, but I can’t talk to nobody but Curley. Else he gets mad.

Humans need social interaction to flourish and they tend to select a few people to become closest with. They share secrets, gossip about others, and support each other in times of need, but how well can someone really know another person? In Nineteen Minutes the reader watches Josie Cormier get ready for school, hiding her private personality away for the day. “Either Josie was someone she didn’t want to be, or she was someone who nobody wanted” (Picoult 8). To all of Josie‘s classmates, friends, teachers, and even her own mother she seems like the perfect child. Josie hangs out with the right crowd, gets great grades, and follows all of society's rules perfectly, but no one really knows who she is. Behind the mask perfection Josie is just another teenager struggling with depression and identity issues. The author chooses to make the most popular girl in school also one of the most depressed to show that although things may seem beautiful on the outside, they can be rotting from the inside. Picoult is proving how that easy it is for people to hide their personalities to the world.

Isolation can be the determining factor in changing one’s mindset. In Ethan Frome, Ethan faces many disappointments throughout the novel. In the novel, Ethan is an orphan since both parents have passed. His wife Zeena who is also his cousin has become the dominant one in the relationship taking over full control. While living in Starkfield, Zeena has suddenly become “sick” and is forced to bring in her cousin Mattie for help around the house. Zeena is depicted as a bitter prematurely old woman who is always “sick” while Mattie is the picture of health as well as the sweetest woman alive. When Mattie comes into the picture, she becomes the speck of happiness in which Ethan longs for but Zeena keeps taking away. This brings up a theme of failure throughout the novel.

To compensate for the bleak circumstances that surround her life, Zeena Frome, in particular, seeks to make her life more interesting. Zeena enjoys playing the role of the center-of-attention. The primary way Zeena gets attention manifests through her illnesses, which she claims result from caring for Ethan’s mother. She whines constantly of her pains and, at one point, Zeena insists that she needs to see a new doctor, which she does. She then returns home and once more complains about the hard labor that she believes she does. However, she neglects to realize that her bleak lifestyle results from her desire to stay in Starkfield, when earlier she has the opportunity to move away. Her negativity leads Ethan to eventually find

The character that completely succumbs to the absolute reality of loneliness is Eleanor Vance. The uniqueness in Eleanor’s character is that she already lives a reality of loneliness, and she hopes to find company while staying at Hill House: “Perhaps I will encounter a devilishly handsome smuggler and… She turned her car onto the last stretch of straight dive leading her directly, face to face, to Hill house… The house was vile. She shivered and thought… get away from here at once.” (Jackson, 23). Eleanor came to Hill House without proper companionship, and yearns to have company. Like the House, Eleanor seems to be facing loneliness anxiety and experiences a basic alienation from making connections between any other human being. In addition

From the very beginning, racial tensions were seen, even from girls of such a young age. While being in the shelter, Twyla did not want to share a room with Roberta because previously her mother had told her that “those people smell funny.” Come to find out, this was an untrue statement and the two girls ended up sticking together; it is the girl’s bond that keeps them sane in this orphanage. They are the only one’s at St. Bonny’s that still actually have parents and this too is a reason they stay so intertwined. The narrator of the story talks of all the things that lessens herself as a person and she is most likely ashamed of. In the early pages of the story, Twyla remembers a time when Maggie ran through the field to catch the bus, which she was inevitably late for. The older girls in the orphanage always gawked at and made fun of this poor woman and the way she walked, which made her fall. Twyla felt tinges of guilt remembering how she never helped Maggie

After Holden arrives in New York and takes a cab to his hotel, he "damn near gave my kid sister Phoebe a buzz, though. I certainly felt like talking to her on the phone. Somebody with sense and all," (66). Holden wants to talk to Phoebe as he has been isolated from her and feels because she is someone who he has a strong connection with, that she will make him less depressed shown by him saying that she had sense. Also while Holden is in his hotel room in New York, after his prostitute leaves, he "felt depressed," then he began "talking, sort of out loud, to Allie," (98). Allie's death made Holden isolated form someone who was close to him. Him attempting to talk to Allie shows how his loneliness and depression was caused by his isolation because he wants to try to reconnect with Allie to end his loneliness. While on his way to a bar from the hotel, Holden describes New York as making him feel "lonesome and depressed" and how he wished "[he] could go home and shoot the bull with old Phoebe," (81). Holden feels lonely and depressed in New York because of his isolation from Phoebe, someone he loves. This is proved by how he describes that he wishes he could go home and talk with her for a while. After getting to New York, Holden's feelings still follow him as he feels lonely and depressed thinking about Phoebe and wanting to see

In “Miss Brill,” Katherine Mansfield utilizes Miss Brill’s thoughts and actions and the surroundings to characterize Miss Brill as a lonely character. Mansfield immediately introduces Miss Brill with a very odd scene that shows her conversation with the fur coat. This quickly and effectively establishes the type of person Miss Brill is. As a result, Mansfield suggests that Miss Brill is a lonely and an “abnormal” person to illustrate to the audience how society treats those who are not considered “normal” through the later actions of a young couple.

Shenli Song College of Foreign Languages, Zhejiang Gongshang University Office of Foreign Language College at Zhejiang Gongshang University Xia Sha City-University-Town, Hangzhou 310018, Zhejiang, China E-mail: windyforever@gmail.com Abstract Katherine Mansfield, remembered as one of the finest writers of English short stories, enjoys enduring fame and a somewhat awesome literary status with her short stories, Miss Brill as one of her representative pieces. The interest of our Chinese critics, in general, locates more in the modernist techniques and devices she employs to present the inner world of the characters in her stories,