Alienation Blog Post #2

Miss Brill by Katherine Mansfield

 I do not understand this short story at all. I think it is kind of depressing though and since we are studying an alienation unit I am leaning towards the idea that Miss Brill is a very lonely old woman. I think she listens in on other people's conversations because she has no one else to talk to. I think she lives alone and reads the newspaper to a dead guy four days a week. She looks forward to Sundays as the day when she can get out and pretend that she is in a performance and is important to others. I got the feeling that she was looking down at the woman in the ermine toque (which I also had to look up) because she says, "...her hair, her face, even her eyes, was the same color as the shabby ermine..." (Mansfield 184). Come to find out that the younger couple finds Miss Brill's fur just as ugly and compare it to a fried whiting. Miss Brill seemed to cherish her fur though and think very highly of it. In the beginning of the story she seemed so happy and excited and at the end, she didn't even go to the bakery she just went home by herself. She could have seem excited at the beginning because she was trying so hard to pretend and suppress something that was bothering her. The last line is very depressing and makes me think that she was the one crying because I don't know what else could be crying--it couldn't possibly be the fur. I think she comes to the realization that she is old and alone and no one likes her. This is very sad to me and I hope I never become like this ever.