20th Century Lit - Zoey

      There isn't much to suggest that Mrs. Dalloway is content with her life. Sure, she walks around happily, taking in the scenery of London, and is excited about preparing for her party, but I think that has more to do with the particular moment than a feeling of general content. These happy moments are contrasted with ones of disappointment that hint to some kind of dissatisfaction under this outward cheerfullness.      Clarissa spends the first couple of pages, and also just at times later along her walk, talking about what a fresh morning it is and how beautiful London looks. Her thoughts have a feeling of general optimism - she's enjoying her life and what she's doing. For example, in this first section she states, "what a morning -- fresh as if issued to a children on bench," and "what she loved; life; London; this moment of June." But then if she was satisfied with life, as these thoughts suggest, why does she become super melancholy and introsp...

          The Mezzanine is different from most novels in a lot of ways, but one way that I think makes a big difference is that Howie is the main and only character in the whole story. Even though many books are centered around a singular character and we only ever see their viewpoint, The Mezzanine takes it to an extreme degree. Howie doesn’t really have any meaningful conversations with or thoughts about anyone except for occasionally L., and even then we never learn much about her. It feels like there simply aren’t any other characters in the story and Howie is the only person in his entire world. Not only is everything he says about other people seemingly trivial and fleeting, which is not too surprising considering the rest of the book, however he also seems less invested in it than any thoughts he has about milk cartons or shiny objects or shoelaces.          The few times Howie interacts with someone, for example with Ti...