Katherine Mansfield's Miss Brill

When faced with difficult situations, humans tend to block out the problem with other aspects or delusions. However, the story “Miss Brill” reveals to us that we cannot shelter ourselves from reality, for the brutal awakening lurking amongst us could corrupt our mind. For instance, Miss Brill caresses her faux fur with motherly presence, admiring the scarf. She briefly acknowledges the ominous feeling that seems to be in the midst of her, but she continues on her usual routine. Miss Brill looks into the foxes “dim little eyes” hearing the tragic question of “what’s happening to me?”. From there, the author, Katherine Mansfield, submerges the audience into Brill’s fantasy world.
From this story, one can conclude that our perception

of reality can often be misjudged due to personal circumstances. In addition, one can learn from this story the harsh reality that society is not as forgiving and packaged, per se, as we lead on to be. There are many individuals like Miss Brill in this world and while they must learn to reach out and take a breath of reality, the people on the outside must appreciate that they don’t understand other’s background. Those individuals must learn to be more accepting of others and who they might choose to portray themselves regardless of their circumstances. The true message behind this story reveals to readers that our inner-selves are our toughest conflict and if we can’t find ourselves to be comfortable with that, we can’t find ourselves to be comfortable with our surrounding environment. Therefore, this will ultimately lead to an inability to differentiate personal perception and reality, forcing one to learn the hard way what actual reality tends to be.