The Form of Culture and Privacy

In his book, The Culture of Time and Space, Kearns discusses the changes in Form during the beginning of the twentieth century. Form is an aspect of space yet can also imply a lot of sense in different orders. It is a sense of organization among the chaos of life. Some of the major points that Kearns talks about are the blending and equalizing of the classes, the rise of the suburbs, and the dissolution of traditional views of privacy.

Life before this time was very compartmentalized and ordered. The classes had clear distinctions and little interaction. “A place for everything, and everything in its place” is a phrase that describes this time quite well. It is then that things started to change and old conventions started to unravel. The relationships people changed as well. The rise of the suburbs brought many of the popular characteristics of urban and rural living together. Places were closer together but not close enough to be intrusive. It is thanks to the innovations in transport that these new compromises could be brought about. Technology like motion pictures made experiences like theater more available to the general public instead of the more well to do.

Technology was not always beneficial to the sense of form. There was a large rise in the invasion of privacy. Party lines for telephones allowed conversations to listen in on by anyone on the line. Anyone with technical know-how could intercept the radio waves as encryption had not come about yet. The flat plate camera allowed the first paparazzi to come into being. Microphones allowed for increased presence of law enforcement and it became more important to watch what is said.

Fast-forward to today, and many of these changes have been expanded until they have become a fact of life. The distinctions between the classes have been blurred into a full spectrum of socio-economic levels barely distinguishable from the next one. The suburbs are large and thriving and even springing up where there are no cities within an easy drive. These communities have become ever more self-sustained and are not dependent on the cities that they originally sprung from. Movies have become an important part of culture and now anyone can make a video and have it viewed by millions of people around the world.

The pervasiveness of such technology has only increased. A video camera and microphone can be concealed in a space as small as a button. Nearly all of our communication can be listened in on. There are security cameras in the vast portion of public areas. A near permanent electronic record is created for nearly every action taken now a day. Then again think of how much people open their lives up. The number of people who share every thought on Twitter or Facebook is staggering. It is so common to publicly broadcast nearly every aspect of your life on the internet that it is hard to imagine the complaints of the early twentieth century over things that seem benign now.

The form of culture and privacy has changed dramatically over the past one hundred years. It makes one wonder if we will just end in some Big Brother state in another hundred where every action is kept track of.

The Distortion of Space and Time in Mrs. Dalloway

After reading the first thirty or so pages of Mrs. Dalloway, we are met with a starkly different portrayal of time and space in lieu of Emma. Mrs. Dalloway, written by Virginia Woolf, takes on a third person unlimited point of view making the reader somewhat of a god. We are able to jump in and out of the minds of each character. Emma was written in third person limited, which meant we were only able to view the world as Emma viewed it while encountering the opinions of others only as they are spoken aloud.

This ability to jump in and out of people’s heads leads to a bending of time and space as the reader is subjected to the conscious of the character whose eyes the world is portrayed through at the time. We see this in Mrs. Dalloway when we are viewing London through the eyes of Lucrezia Smith. In her eyes, we see that men are selfish. We see London as a lonely and foreign place. We view the people in the streets as “half alive” compared to the “people walking, laughing out loud” in Italy (23). On the other hand, when we are in the mind of Clarissa Dalloway we see the world differently. London is a familiar sight, but not necessarily comforting. We wish we “could have had [our] life over again” (10). Each character perceives space differently and as a result we end up with various descriptions of the same place, twisted by the beholder to whom we are tied.

Also twisted to the will of Virginia Woolf is time. Once again, the character viewing the world can bend this aspect of Mrs. Dalloway. For example, Clarissa is constantly bringing up images of the past as they come to her mind, and we are thereby subjected to her detailed stories recalled from her memory. A specific instance of this is Clarissa’s recounting of Sally Seton. Here we are suddenly different time and place viewing Sally as a girl who “sat on the floor” and was “smoking a cigarette” at the time. The book even goes as far as to subject us to Clarissa’s lack of memory as she attempts to remember, “Where could it have been? The Mannings” (32)? In yet another passage, we recall with Clarissa how Hugh and Peter were quite different: “She could remember scene after scene at Bourton – Peter furious; Hugh not, of course” (6).

The ability to warp space through the memory of the current primary character can make the book quite confusing, but it accomplishes exactly what Woolf wants. In Woolf’s view, it is viewing the world through a character’s eyes and perspective that makes them so life-like. In Mrs. Dalloway, she takes this idea to the extreme. We not only view the world as they do, we think what they think. We recount events just as they do. Through hearing tales of their past as told through their bias, we get a feel for the type of person they are. The bending of time and space in this book is almost entirely due to the changing perspectives employed by Woolf in the creation of this literary work.

Interpretations of Emma using Woolf as a Basis

Virginia Woolf, an early twentieth century novelist had a different perspective on good character development than many of her predecessors. She was well known for her essay on the topic, “Character in Fiction” in which she describes the changes in character development throughout the previous couple of generations of writers. She described these generations by reigning English royalty. The Victorians were described as relying on describing possessions and surroundings to develop their characters. The Edwardians were criticized for using their works as a social commentary. Woolf believed that the members of her group, the Georgians, were striving for increased realism in their characters from the basis of reflecting the thoughts and feelings of the characters.

I would now like to take a look at Emma by Jane Austen in these circumstances. Overall the novel has a very Victorian feel, but elements of the other groups of writers can be extracted from the work. The Victorian feel comes from the descriptions of surroundings and the importance of appearances and the detail to the physical descriptions. This is to be expected as and the detail to the physical descriptions. This is to be expected as Emma was written nearly one hundred years before Woolf wrote her essay.

There are also elements of social criticism in Emma. I feel that there is critique of how important class and status matter to the characters. It seems that all Emma is driven by is the proper maintenance of status as befitting one of her station. This may just be me projecting my thoughts onto the work, a habit that I find annoying at the least. Unfortunately it is difficult for a work of literature to remain unshaded by the perceptions and thoughts of the reader. Still there could be said that there is a critique on Emma and her notions of class are overly detrimental to society of the time, yet even now nearly two hundred years later class still matters, not nearly as much as the past, but enough to make it noticeable. This kind of commentary of society was one of the main criticisms of the Edwardian style of writing.

Emma has very little of the Georgian style of character development. I would argue that the only character that could fit that general method of character development. Georgian writing mainly emphasizes realistic character development through looking at the characters actions, reactions, and thoughts. The only character whose thoughts are apparent to the reader in Emma are Emma’s. The reader can get a good sense of the characters ‘education’ as her preconceived notions are slowly questioned. All the other characters feel flat or unknown in comparison. Harriet just feels like a pale shadow of Emma herself. Many of the side characters are very blunt and have little to no real impact on the feel of the other characters. Some of the situations created by them can lead to insight into how Emma’s view on the world is changing throughout the novel which is similar to “Miss Brill”. None of the other characters were impactful, but Miss Brill’s reactions to them provided a lot of insight into her feelings and produced empathy from the reader for the character. I have yet to feel that way in regards to Emma. Hopefully further readings will shed further insight on the character and her education.

~Matthew McKenna

Miss Brill and Perspective

During the time the short story Miss Brill was written, there was a good deal of discussion and disagreement in the area of characterization when writing. The two main schools of thought on the matter differed when it came to the character’s perspective. One school of thought, joined by Arnold Bennett and H.G. Wells, maintains that a character should be defined by their material possessions or the exterior of a scene. The second school of thought believes that a story should be written by defining the character through the character’s eyes. This is done by describing what is going on inside the character’s head. These two schools of thought differ on a single factor that can make a massive impact on a story. With a simple change in characterization, perspective changes, emotion changes, and tone changes.

Miss Brill was written around 1920 by Katherine Mansfield. In the story, Mansfield seems to take such a simple plot and turn it into an emotional storytelling experience. A woman is out and about around her town on a Sunday and the scene is given through her eyes. We see how happy the woman is in the beginning. Slowly the story turns. Miss Brill states that the last Sunday she was out “hadn’t been as interesting as usual” (299). The audience gets the sense that Miss Brill’s life is a tad monotonous. She is just waiting for someone to spark up a conversation with her. The audience gains such a deep respect for the woman because they understand her situation. They see her get teased by the couple from the “yacht club” that come and sit on the bench. This is a painful experience for the audience. The reader wants to jump into the story and tell those kids to stop. Instead, the story shifts. The beautiful descriptions of the gorgeous fall day go away. Miss Brill’s attitude changed so the story changed.

When there is a change in attitude in a story, time seems to change too. Much like time seems to speed up when a person is excited or happy, time shifts when you are unhappy. We see this with Miss Brill. The entire story is through Miss Brill’s eyes. When all of a sudden we see her day end when the two kids tease her, the audience is given the true sense of how hurt Miss Brill was. Miss Brill then goes straight from being on the bench with the children to her small one room apartment, skipping her usual bakery stop. We see how truly isolated Miss Brill is. She has no one. She thinks she hears her scarf screaming as she puts it back in its box but perhaps it is herself screaming on the inside, an old lady alone hurt by the young people of society. Miss Brill will always have next Sunday though. Hopefully someone starts a conversation with her. Hopefully the kids don’t tease her. The audience sure knows how much Miss Brill would like it if those things would happen next Sunday.

Woolf's Character Showing a Change in Humanity

Virginia Woolf was a novelist in the early twentieth century. She was involved in a number of discussions concerning the parameters of great art and literature. According to Virginia Woolf in her essay "Character in Fiction," "on or about December 1910 human character changed" (421). Through a change in literature and the arts we are able to examine and understand the true elements of this change and how it came about.

Woolf describes authors in her era as being a part of three major groups: the Victorians, the Edwardians, and the Georgians. These divisions are based on the reigning eras of the royal families in England. The Victorians are characterized as describing a human being by their surroundings and their possessions, clothes, etc. As the oldest group of the three, this is typical since in the older times a person was viewed according to their belongings and family status. The Edwardians are accused as using their novels as a social commentary while still failing to properly characterize humans in their works. Finally, the Georgians are the new generation of writers. Woolf characterizes herself under this artistic grouping. The major difference: what creates realism in a fictional character. This stark contrast is what Woolf argues throughout the majority of her writings.

The Victorians and Edwardians focus on external details and monotonous descriptions rather than on the perspective of the character. Woolf believes that characters should not be defined by the way they look or what they are surrounded by. Rather, characters should be described by their beliefs and their views of the world and its various objects. No longer are characters judged and confined to their clothes, their family, or their land.

The world began to cast away these prejudgments and give every soul equality and a fair shot at life. It was indeed a small step, but a giant step at the same time. Though the progress was not that massive compared to what we see today, but it was necessary and momentous. This shift in viewing a person - ignoring their surroundings and focusing on their perspective - eventually led to a change in space and the blurring of class lines. One can even view these changes in art. Where paintings were once based around social class, they are now put into a realistic perspective. Where once a master and servant were in different worlds, now they interact. Where a husband once had dominance over his wife, there now came a shift towards moderation and equality. Now that there was a shift towards social equality, what would become of art? Surely it would be effected by these changes.

Eventually these shifts led to a split in artistic culture. There became a culture appealing to the masses and a culture that appealed to artists themselves. Though social class had been done away with, a sort of artistic bourgeoisie arose to appreciate art for its academic value: thus high culture arose. Pop culture is that which is marketed to the public and follows a more non-academic and entertaining approach.

Spatial Barriers

In Jane Austen’s Emma, there is a strict sense of social barriers confining individuals to stay within their class or possibly trying to hang out with those a class above themselves. This novel seems to be expressing the social restrictions that were the norm in the 19^th century. Emma is not even open to the idea that her best friend marry, Harriet, marry Mr. Martin because as she states “The yeomanry are precisely the order of people with whom I feel I can have nothing to do with" (30).

Emma seems to have her mind made up in the fact that social class is everything. Social class governs their time, determines where you are and determines who you can hang out with. It is a social barrier and in turn becomes a spatial barrier just by the fact that in Emma’s time class decides space. Trying to compare this idea to our time is partly difficult. Our world in the 21^st century seems to be less interested in class and more in the fact of whether or not you have the money. In the 19^th century one was born into a social class and, like Emma implies in her quote, one will always be the class they were born into. She makes it seem like there would be no chance for Mr. Martin to change. So instead she advises Harriet to look at a rich man born into wealth, surely a fine candidate for marriage during the time.

Over time our culture has assimilated in a sense and gotten used to the fact that one may be born into a social class but it is not the controlling factor. It seems that in today’s world there are so many more factors that can add to or take away from your total net value. Today you have you internet value, you monetary value, your property value, etc. In the 19^th century all you had was your name and your land. Hopefully you have a name with a rich heritage. But also if you had the most land in the town you were considered the wealthiest. During that time it would have been very difficult to get land any means other than passed down by the family.

What makes this so interesting is the way this book can capture culture in a relatable location 200 years ago. One can see what culture was like and draw connections seeing how far we have come and figured out. Humans have the ability to change their situation nowadays. One can be working to minimum wage jobs living on the south side barely getting by. In the 19^th century people had no means to get out of a hole like this once they were in it but in the 21st century if you can scrape together a little bit of money, it can go a long way: inventing, investing in stocks, lottery, schooling, etc.. Our culture makes it easier to get out of that hole and never ending cycle of trying to get out of debt.

Perceptions of Emma Woodhouse

Time and space can be defined and presented in many different ways. Most of the time we simply try to explain and define time and space for ourselves in the present, although it can be just as insightful to do so for a given person and time, for example Emma Woodhouse from Jane Austen’s Emma. Throughout this book there are many elements that help us define a sense of time and space- despite the fact that it is fictitious- and in doing so it can make it much easier to understand and connect with the story.

To briefly summarize the portion of the book that I will discuss, the book Emma takes place in England during the late eighteenth century, a time before almost all of today’s technology. The main character in the book is Emma Woodhouse who is an intelligent, beautiful, and very well-to-do young lady. She has recently “lost” a good friend due to marriage and has decided to spend her time refining a young girl, Harriet Smith, with intentions of marrying her to a man named Mr. Elton. However, there is another man, Mr. Martin, who wishes to marry Harriet, but Emma thinks of him as too lowly of a man for Harriett and convinces her to deny his proposal.

Emma’s perception of space is immediately and obviously different than ours. The story begins with her being deeply upset that her house maid and life-long friend, Miss Taylor/Mrs. Weston, is getting married and will therefore have to move out. Emma seems to act as if she will never see her again because she is now what I would guess to be about two miles away, which, if provided a horse and carriage, is not very far at all. Also, Emma spends almost all of her time at her own home, Hartfield. The book does not say exactly why this is but I find it very peculiar because she appears to interact with only a few people yet she is thoroughly concerned with what everyone thinks of her. I think that this helps show that Emma perceives her home at Hartfield as the only place of any importance.

The perception of time in the book is not as apparent as space is. In fact I believe the way Jane Austen writes the book is really the only perception of time that we can gather from and not so much how Emma perceives time. For example, Jane Austen leaves out almost any details about time; rarely mentioning how much time has passed from one scene to the next or even what time of day it is. This is a very interesting style of writing because it makes a majority of the book seem as if everything is one big event or even at times a sort of montage.

The setting and timing in this book quite clearly shows the differences in our perception of time and space as opposed to that of Emma Woodhouse’s. Also, in trying to identify and explain these differences it becomes both easier to understand the characters and their reasoning as well as provide a new aspect to how one reads and interprets the story of the book.