Bliss and Miss Brill by Katherine Mansfield and Story of an Hour by Kate Chopin I have associated all the stories with a sense of female repression.

This shows how the act of knowing about the affair does not change her marriage hence, showing that she is repressed by it.

'Miss Brill', also by Mansfield uses the same kind of language throughout such as her great detail to colour and describing in masses of detail.

Miss Brill, the main character throughout the story is repressed by her lifestyle. She does not realise this till after a specific event has occurred and is blissfully happy at the beginning.

Miss Brill every Sunday afternoon would go to the park, sit on a bench and generally watch people. She is happy to do this week after week and her happiness is exposed in the way she always has positive comments about people such as 'they were beautifully dressed' and 'the hero and the heroine of course...' These are all positive comments and she literally says in the text how much she enjoys it, 'oh, how fascinating it was! How she enjoyed it. How she loved sitting there.'

On criticism she does make is of the other people who are there every week and she describes them as 'odd, silent, nearly all old, and from the way they stared they looked as thought they'd come from dark little rooms or even- even cupboards.'

This line has a major relevance to her repression as these people she is describing, she is one of them, yet she doesn't realise it till the end.

The realisation occurs towards the end when the heroine, the girl made an unpleasant comment about Miss Brill. Miss Brill, who is obviously listening soon comes to a realisation that not everyone is as kind as her and she is, in fact one of them old people.

This ties in with repression as she is repressed and constrained by her lifestyle; she does the same thing week after week and does not break the routine.

Miss Brill also, always listens and never speaks I have come to realise from looking at the text. This was easy to realise due to the lack of speech, as the majority of the story is her thoughts.

'Story of an hour' also has the theme of a revelation taking place at the end. I believe that the revelation in this case was much more extreme. Mrs Mallard actually dies because of what is revealed to her. This story uses the opposite emotions to the other two. She is happy at the beginning and sad at the end, this is due to her being told her husband has been killed in a rail accident that she is in fact happy. The reason she is sad and dies of disappointment is finding out that her husband is not in fact dead and this is shown through his appearance at the door.

Her husband is repressing her, which is obvious due to the fact she is so sad on his return. If she loved him she would have been thrilled to see him again instead of dying due to a heart attack and disappointment. It would have been a major shock even if she were happy to see him, which is why everyone thought she died.

There are many reasons why it was obvious that she was being repressed by her husband and many of these are during the time when she is locked in her room and talking to herself.

'Free! Body and soul free!' she whispers this to herself and she is obviously blissful to have had her husband die and I think this is why the author has done it. Chopin has done it throughout to give clues to the line at the end 'of joy that kills' to show the reader why she really died- which is not because she was thrilled to see him.

'There would be no one to live for in them coming years; she would live for herself.' This shows that before when he was 'alive' she wasn't happy and was restrained in aspects of her life. These many hints at how unhappy she was eventually turn into a clear picture that she had not been happy by the end of the story.

In the story of 'Bliss' there are other signs of repression, not necessarily by a husband figure but by other characters in the story and by Bertha's life in general. An example of this is that she is not in control of the situation with her baby and its nanny. She has no control over what is done with the baby and seems afraid to ask if she is allowed to hold her own baby. 'Bertha wanted to ask...' showing she didn't ask but would have liked to. She is being restrained by the nanny into having a full motherly relationship with her child.

One example of how Harry subdues her is how he bullies her into believing Pearl is a dull, boring, and a typical blonde. Harry seems to have obtained the ability to demystify and trick Bertha. Which is a sign he has been doing this for a while and he has become quite expert at it. I think Mansfield did this to prepare the reader slightly for what is going to happen at the end n the revelation that is the affair.

The theme of repression therefore runs throughout these stories all written by female authors that have a female view on the world. It is typical of female characters to make men out to be the cruel characters and the women who are the vulnerable main characters who are being repressed.

Rachael Dunderdale

AS ENGLISH LANGUAGE & LITERATURE - Unit 3a: Shorter Fiction Study