Literature
The first question which must be asked, and which will subsequently bring us to greater understanding of the story, is the question of the identity of the lady in the looking glass. The story calls her Isabella Tyson, but certain clues lead one to believe she may be someone else. The story uses a looking glass as a metaphor for the lady's character, which we will presently discuss in more depth. The title and subtitle of the piece indicate that the story is a mean of examining a lady via her reflection in a looking glass. One does not uses a looking glass to examine another person. One uses a looking glass: Virginia Woolf. The story then becomes Woolf's attempt to examine her own character through the vehicle of modern narrative techniques. However, to understand the true beauty of Woolf's execution of this, we must examine her use of modern styles and themes more in depth.
The strongest theme which in this story is the distinctly modern theme of the split self. Here we see one figure with many levels of character. This theme is accentuated through the metaphor of the looking glass. The first picture we receive in the story is a contrast between the interior of the house and ts exterior as seen though the looking glass. The interior is a world of movement. Its portrayed as a dynamic environment that is constantly in a state of flux from one state to another. The play of light and shadow, as well as the animal images, give the picture a sense of hidden depths, things not seen from the surface. This is consistent with modern ideas about the fluidity of character. A person's character is something which changes according to mood or circumstance. It cannot be captured in one still image. It is in constant motion. In contrast, the image of the house's exterior, as reflected in the looking glass, is still, serene, and peaceful. There's movement, only a placid surface. Additionally let us remember that an image reflected in a glass is flat and two dimensional, and that when looking at an object, one cannot see whats within the object; one can only see the reflection of its surface. It doesn't, indeed cannot, reflect the true depth of the object. Applying this metaphor to the split self, the interior image of the house reflects deep interior of the self, constantly shifting, changing and adapting, hidden away from the world behind doors. The external image of the house is the looking glass reflection is that part of the self as seen by the world, a mask hiding in one fixed expression all the rolling turbulence beneath. The internal and external images of the self are by no means corresponding. In fact, as seen in this story, they are often wildly different.
The main style of the narrative which Wolf uses is the stream of consciousness technique. From the images of the house we learn not only the physical aspects of the house, but the impressions they leave as well. The Narrator's attention is then drawn from the house to its mistress, Isabella Tyson. First she thinks about Isabella based on her appearance and behavior: "She suggested the fantastic and the tremulous convolous" She then reviews the established facts about Isabella's life: that she is single, rich and travels, as if these things embody the lady herself and tell the reader everything he needs to know. But this is not satisfactory and she begins to wonder what might be hiding deep within the little drawers of Isabella's mind. It is at this point that the narrator's musings are interrupted by the mail, an event which changes the picture under contemplation and leads the narrator down a track of thought. She contemplated what Isabella talks about and realizes that this can't in fact encompass the whole person, as she says: "Its was her profounder state of being that one wanted to catch and turn to words". And finally, as Isabella maker her way back to the house and finds her letters, the narrator feels that she sees the true woman. And in her the narrator finds nothing. This beautiful woman with the lovely house and exciting life is nothing but empty. We hear every thought within the narrator's mind . We follow her as she examines Isabella's character. We see her change mind begin again. This then is how real thought occurs Instead of a narrative that states relevant facts, we follow a person's mind as it wanders to and fro. In this way the reader receives a deeper understanding of Isabella that is possible under conventional narrative styles.
An interesting point to make about this story is that it is not, if the lady is indeed Woolf herself, only a soul searching story about a lady. It is story about how to write in stream-of-consciousness technique. In addition to coming to conclusions about Isabella, simultaneously with these conclusions, describes in detail the stream-of-consciousness. First, Woolf makes her case. Earlier in the story the narrator examines Isabella based on her looks, her dinner conversation, and facts about her life. She goes on to say: "she could no longer escape one must prize her open with the first tool that came to hand". This type of "prying" indicates a conventional approach to narration The character is treated roughly, as though it were fixed and crude. But this approach does not satisfy and the narrator states: "To talk of prizing her open" to use any but the finest and subtlest and most pliable tools upon her was impious and absurd". In this sentence the narrator realizes that a person is much deeper than originally believed and that one must look for more subtle ways to expose the true person : the stream of consciousness is difficult to follow and see clearly, but like Isabella getting "larger and larger in the looking glass, more and more completely the person", one gets a feel for the person that conventional narrative could not supply. She adds that each thought in the stream-of-consciousness technique adds to the whole picture giving deeper understanding about the person and "brings in some new element which gently moves and alters the other objects". She concludes that using this technique one can see past the reflection into the true object; 'Everything dropped from her all that one had called the creeper and the convolous. Here was the woman herself. " This story about the subtleties of stream-of-consciousness in narrative.
All of these points combine to make Virginia Woolf's story "The Lady in the Looking Glass:A Reflection" the epitome of modern narrative fiction. Its all the more impressive when one realizes that the stream-of-consciousness technique is used to understand not the person supposedly sitting in the room doing the thinking, but the lady who is reflected in the glass. Normally the stream-of-consciousness technique is used to understand the thinker. In this story, its used to understand someone else; some one reflected in the glass. This is yet one more elegantly constructed hint that the thinker and the person in the glass are identical. And lets remember, one uses the looking glass to reflect one's self, thus combing the lady, the narrator and the author:Virginia Woolf.
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Literature
The Lady in the Looking Glass Summary and Analysis
The Lady in the Looking Glass: A Reflection
"The Lady in the Looking Glass: A Reflection," is a short story by Virginia Woolf published in Harper's in December 1929, describes the images reflected in a mirror situated in a woman's dressing room, providing a glimpse of the furnishing of her life, but, pointedly, not allowing us a glimpse into the square motifs and illustrates in a concentrated, more explicit form many of the themes that Woolf had explored in more death and complicity in Jacob's Room and To The Light House.The first question which must be asked, and which will subsequently bring us to greater understanding of the story, is the question of the identity of the lady in the looking glass. The story calls her Isabella Tyson, but certain clues lead one to believe she may be someone else. The story uses a looking glass as a metaphor for the lady's character, which we will presently discuss in more depth. The title and subtitle of the piece indicate that the story is a mean of examining a lady via her reflection in a looking glass. One does not uses a looking glass to examine another person. One uses a looking glass: Virginia Woolf. The story then becomes Woolf's attempt to examine her own character through the vehicle of modern narrative techniques. However, to understand the true beauty of Woolf's execution of this, we must examine her use of modern styles and themes more in depth.
The strongest theme which in this story is the distinctly modern theme of the split self. Here we see one figure with many levels of character. This theme is accentuated through the metaphor of the looking glass. The first picture we receive in the story is a contrast between the interior of the house and ts exterior as seen though the looking glass. The interior is a world of movement. Its portrayed as a dynamic environment that is constantly in a state of flux from one state to another. The play of light and shadow, as well as the animal images, give the picture a sense of hidden depths, things not seen from the surface. This is consistent with modern ideas about the fluidity of character. A person's character is something which changes according to mood or circumstance. It cannot be captured in one still image. It is in constant motion. In contrast, the image of the house's exterior, as reflected in the looking glass, is still, serene, and peaceful. There's movement, only a placid surface. Additionally let us remember that an image reflected in a glass is flat and two dimensional, and that when looking at an object, one cannot see whats within the object; one can only see the reflection of its surface. It doesn't, indeed cannot, reflect the true depth of the object. Applying this metaphor to the split self, the interior image of the house reflects deep interior of the self, constantly shifting, changing and adapting, hidden away from the world behind doors. The external image of the house is the looking glass reflection is that part of the self as seen by the world, a mask hiding in one fixed expression all the rolling turbulence beneath. The internal and external images of the self are by no means corresponding. In fact, as seen in this story, they are often wildly different.
The main style of the narrative which Wolf uses is the stream of consciousness technique. From the images of the house we learn not only the physical aspects of the house, but the impressions they leave as well. The Narrator's attention is then drawn from the house to its mistress, Isabella Tyson. First she thinks about Isabella based on her appearance and behavior: "She suggested the fantastic and the tremulous convolous" She then reviews the established facts about Isabella's life: that she is single, rich and travels, as if these things embody the lady herself and tell the reader everything he needs to know. But this is not satisfactory and she begins to wonder what might be hiding deep within the little drawers of Isabella's mind. It is at this point that the narrator's musings are interrupted by the mail, an event which changes the picture under contemplation and leads the narrator down a track of thought. She contemplated what Isabella talks about and realizes that this can't in fact encompass the whole person, as she says: "Its was her profounder state of being that one wanted to catch and turn to words". And finally, as Isabella maker her way back to the house and finds her letters, the narrator feels that she sees the true woman. And in her the narrator finds nothing. This beautiful woman with the lovely house and exciting life is nothing but empty. We hear every thought within the narrator's mind . We follow her as she examines Isabella's character. We see her change mind begin again. This then is how real thought occurs Instead of a narrative that states relevant facts, we follow a person's mind as it wanders to and fro. In this way the reader receives a deeper understanding of Isabella that is possible under conventional narrative styles.
An interesting point to make about this story is that it is not, if the lady is indeed Woolf herself, only a soul searching story about a lady. It is story about how to write in stream-of-consciousness technique. In addition to coming to conclusions about Isabella, simultaneously with these conclusions, describes in detail the stream-of-consciousness. First, Woolf makes her case. Earlier in the story the narrator examines Isabella based on her looks, her dinner conversation, and facts about her life. She goes on to say: "she could no longer escape one must prize her open with the first tool that came to hand". This type of "prying" indicates a conventional approach to narration The character is treated roughly, as though it were fixed and crude. But this approach does not satisfy and the narrator states: "To talk of prizing her open" to use any but the finest and subtlest and most pliable tools upon her was impious and absurd". In this sentence the narrator realizes that a person is much deeper than originally believed and that one must look for more subtle ways to expose the true person : the stream of consciousness is difficult to follow and see clearly, but like Isabella getting "larger and larger in the looking glass, more and more completely the person", one gets a feel for the person that conventional narrative could not supply. She adds that each thought in the stream-of-consciousness technique adds to the whole picture giving deeper understanding about the person and "brings in some new element which gently moves and alters the other objects". She concludes that using this technique one can see past the reflection into the true object; 'Everything dropped from her all that one had called the creeper and the convolous. Here was the woman herself. " This story about the subtleties of stream-of-consciousness in narrative.
All of these points combine to make Virginia Woolf's story "The Lady in the Looking Glass:A Reflection" the epitome of modern narrative fiction. Its all the more impressive when one realizes that the stream-of-consciousness technique is used to understand not the person supposedly sitting in the room doing the thinking, but the lady who is reflected in the glass. Normally the stream-of-consciousness technique is used to understand the thinker. In this story, its used to understand someone else; some one reflected in the glass. This is yet one more elegantly constructed hint that the thinker and the person in the glass are identical. And lets remember, one uses the looking glass to reflect one's self, thus combing the lady, the narrator and the author:Virginia Woolf.
by Virginia Woolf
Funny Parody
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Stephen Spender (1909-1995) mixed with a number of left wing poets while at oxford including W.H Auden, and joined the fight against Fran coin the Spanish Civil war. Always interested in human and social concerns, he questioned how poetry could address...
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Philip Larkin (1922-1985) is a poet whose work is very popular, despite his reputation for being a pessimistic, death-obsessed and darkly humorous observer of humanity. In this poem, Larkin...
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