ENG 1120 Lecture Notes - Katherine Mansfield, Short Story, Pathetic Fallacy
Document Summary
Bertha doesn"t desire her husband until page 154. Bertha did not even love her baby at first. She was fond" and liked" her baby, but never admitted to loving her baby. Although we do not see it, there is a foreshadowing that her relationship with her husband is not how it seems. The example of adam and eve in bliss (the pear tree, the gray cat to represent the snake) gives us an insight that bertha is in her bliss, and it"s trying to stray us from the situation. An insight that her husband is having an affair with pearl fulton. Why doth the bridegroom tarry? popular quote from the bible. When repeated twice, it becomes more significant. The exchange she imagines between harry and pearl is from bertha"s pov. reading the lips. With harmony with the pear tree in the beginning, but later becomes meaningless. Her outlook on the pear tree has changed, as had she.
