Even after several readings, this story left me perplexed, so I went back to the narrator as he or she—well, they, for the sake of convenience—seemed to be the one fixed point of reference in the story. We are told that they are looking at their surroundings from “the depths of the sofa in the drawing-room”. From this vantage point, the visitor can see a mirror hanging on the wall in an adjoining hallway, which reflects a marble-top table and “a stretch of the garden beyond”, apparently visible through a window or door. The visitor is alone in the home, as the mistress of the house, Isabella Tyson, left them about a half hour earlier to go out into her garden, apparently to cut some flowers.
But why would Isabella leave her guest alone for half an hour while she went out to the garden? Why not invite her visitor to come with her? And why does the visitor remain seated on the sofa for the entire length of the story? Why do they not get up and walk over to the door leading to the outside to see if they can catch sight of Isabella in the garden? Why not walk out and join her? We are told that the visitor has been to Isabella’s home before and is curious about the contents of the little drawers in the cabinets in the drawing room—do they contain old love letters? So, why not get up off the sofa and gratify one’s curiosity about the little drawers while Isabella is out in the garden?
The fact that the visitor remains fixed in place during the story led me to speculate that perhaps the narrator of the story is not human. We are given a warning about the dangers of people keeping mirrors in their houses, so perhaps the story is being told from the point-of-view of a mirror in the drawing room reflecting, and being reflected by, another mirror in the adjacent hallway, conveying the impression that mirrors keep their owners under constant surveillance.
At the end of the story when Isabella returns from her walk in the garden and stands by the hallway mirror, we are told that “the looking-glass began to pour over her a light” that allowed the narrator to see Isabella as she really is: “Here was the woman herself.” Since it is a mirror pouring forth this light to reveal the true Isabella, perhaps only another mirror could perceive what the other mirror revealed: to the human eye, Isabella would retain her everyday appearance. Perhaps there is a way of making this fanciful interpretation work, but it seems unlikely given the narrator’s references to themself as a “person”, so we’re likely dealing with a human, not a mirror.
While reading the story, I recalled something I had read about Virginia Woolf having developed an aversion to mirrors in later life. Apparently, she came to believe mirrors did not reflect reality. This seems an odd position to take, considering that mirrors are typically taken to reflect reality in unflinching detail. The only situation that occurs to me where VW’s theory about mirrors might apply is a phenomenon I have noticed about myself whenever I’m getting ready to go for a haircut.
I’ll be at home looking at myself in the bathroom mirror, all freshly shaved, showered, brushed and flossed, and I’ll think to myself, “I’m not such a bad looking guy for a fellow my age.” But as soon as I sit down in the barber’s chair and have the hair dresser standing behind me, looking over my shoulder at our reflections in the barbershop mirror, asking me if I want “the usual, over the ears and shortened up all ‘round”, then I’ll see an image of myself looking distinctly older from the one I saw in my bathroom mirror at home. It’s as if the simple fact of having another person’s reflection in the mirror alongside my own acts as a corrective reality-check to my own false perception of myself, and leaves me no choice but to observe all the wrinkles, creases, and incipient jowls that my mind was somehow able to filter out at home.
I wonder if it was something along these lines that VW was getting at. Mirrors are not passive reflectors of the world. Unlike photographs, what they show us is a reverse image of ourselves, not the outward self that other people see. As my personal example may testify, they may also have the capacity to show us what we want to see, not the world as it really is. Of course, the story’s explanation may lie in the description we are given in the final scene: that is, that the mirror has some sort of supernatural power to pour out a light that reveals the real, essential Isabella Tyson, devoid of all her pretences and accoutrements of social status.
We are left to wonder whether this is the first time the narrator has witnessed the mirror’s effect upon Isabella, or is it a regular occurrence? Is this why the visitor remains seated on the drawing room sofa throughout the story, because this is the best vantage point from which to observe Isabella’s transformation, of which she is presumably unaware.
I’ve started reading Hermione Lee’s biography of Virginia Woolf, and just today came to p. 123 where the author discusses some of the troubling and unhappy associations that mirrors held for VW throughout her life. First, there was an incident which took place when young Virginia was looking at herself in a hallway mirror at home one day. For some reason, she suddenly felt such shame and guilt that she remembered the sensation for the rest of her life, and always referred to it as “the looking-glass shame.”
The adult VW speculated that her reaction was the result of some lingering Puritan influence in her background that was shamed by giving in to the sin of vanity and looking at herself in a mirror. It was also around this time that VW had a dreamlike experience, in which she was looking in a mirror when suddenly “a horrible face” appeared over her shoulder. Without going into detail, Lee’s biography also relates that VW’s “looking-glass shame” became interwoven in her mind with the shame of being sexually molested by her older half-brother, Gerald Duckworth, when she was six-years-old. So, perhaps in VW’s mind, the idea took hold of mirrors being associated, not with one’s external appearance, but as objects that burned away our outer selves to reveal the real person underneath, with all their inner shame and guilt.
Thank you for this Tom. I really enjoyed reading your comment and your detailed reading of the story and VW's relationship to mirrors. Yes, I really took the narrator to be an other-worldly figure (perhaps, as Ronald suggested, a manifestation of the novelist) because of the factors you mention - the weirdness of her sitting in Isabella's drawing room for an extended period while Isabella is out in the garden. It doesn't seem quite real.
I loved your idea that 'mirrors keep their owners under constant surveillance.' And also that mirrors are not 'passive reflectors of the world.'
I've only dipped into bits of Hermoine Lee's biography at this point so I didn't know about VW's unhappy associations with mirrors. How interesting!
I think none of us looks very good in the hairdresser's mirror - I maintain that the hairdresser's smock does us a disservice!!
Thanks for your kind words, Tash! As far as mirrors go, there's all that lore about magic mirrors, and vampires not casting a reflection, and so on. I also wondered whether the narrator's observations of things seeming to move in the drawing room, where "nothing stayed the same for two seconds together", might have been drawn from VW's own visual experiences during her periods of mental breakdown.
I loved this conversation. Tash, you gave us the option to just listen without reading the story first, and being lazy that's what I did, but afterwards was moved to read it anyway. A wonderful story, and much improved, for me, by your chat with Ronald.
Ahh, the imagination—always getting up to mischief :) What a wonderful conversation with Ronald, and a great short story by Virginia Woolf. I enjoyed it immensely. Thank you, Tash!
Even after several readings, this story left me perplexed, so I went back to the narrator as he or she—well, they, for the sake of convenience—seemed to be the one fixed point of reference in the story. We are told that they are looking at their surroundings from “the depths of the sofa in the drawing-room”. From this vantage point, the visitor can see a mirror hanging on the wall in an adjoining hallway, which reflects a marble-top table and “a stretch of the garden beyond”, apparently visible through a window or door. The visitor is alone in the home, as the mistress of the house, Isabella Tyson, left them about a half hour earlier to go out into her garden, apparently to cut some flowers.
But why would Isabella leave her guest alone for half an hour while she went out to the garden? Why not invite her visitor to come with her? And why does the visitor remain seated on the sofa for the entire length of the story? Why do they not get up and walk over to the door leading to the outside to see if they can catch sight of Isabella in the garden? Why not walk out and join her? We are told that the visitor has been to Isabella’s home before and is curious about the contents of the little drawers in the cabinets in the drawing room—do they contain old love letters? So, why not get up off the sofa and gratify one’s curiosity about the little drawers while Isabella is out in the garden?
The fact that the visitor remains fixed in place during the story led me to speculate that perhaps the narrator of the story is not human. We are given a warning about the dangers of people keeping mirrors in their houses, so perhaps the story is being told from the point-of-view of a mirror in the drawing room reflecting, and being reflected by, another mirror in the adjacent hallway, conveying the impression that mirrors keep their owners under constant surveillance.
At the end of the story when Isabella returns from her walk in the garden and stands by the hallway mirror, we are told that “the looking-glass began to pour over her a light” that allowed the narrator to see Isabella as she really is: “Here was the woman herself.” Since it is a mirror pouring forth this light to reveal the true Isabella, perhaps only another mirror could perceive what the other mirror revealed: to the human eye, Isabella would retain her everyday appearance. Perhaps there is a way of making this fanciful interpretation work, but it seems unlikely given the narrator’s references to themself as a “person”, so we’re likely dealing with a human, not a mirror.
While reading the story, I recalled something I had read about Virginia Woolf having developed an aversion to mirrors in later life. Apparently, she came to believe mirrors did not reflect reality. This seems an odd position to take, considering that mirrors are typically taken to reflect reality in unflinching detail. The only situation that occurs to me where VW’s theory about mirrors might apply is a phenomenon I have noticed about myself whenever I’m getting ready to go for a haircut.
I’ll be at home looking at myself in the bathroom mirror, all freshly shaved, showered, brushed and flossed, and I’ll think to myself, “I’m not such a bad looking guy for a fellow my age.” But as soon as I sit down in the barber’s chair and have the hair dresser standing behind me, looking over my shoulder at our reflections in the barbershop mirror, asking me if I want “the usual, over the ears and shortened up all ‘round”, then I’ll see an image of myself looking distinctly older from the one I saw in my bathroom mirror at home. It’s as if the simple fact of having another person’s reflection in the mirror alongside my own acts as a corrective reality-check to my own false perception of myself, and leaves me no choice but to observe all the wrinkles, creases, and incipient jowls that my mind was somehow able to filter out at home.
I wonder if it was something along these lines that VW was getting at. Mirrors are not passive reflectors of the world. Unlike photographs, what they show us is a reverse image of ourselves, not the outward self that other people see. As my personal example may testify, they may also have the capacity to show us what we want to see, not the world as it really is. Of course, the story’s explanation may lie in the description we are given in the final scene: that is, that the mirror has some sort of supernatural power to pour out a light that reveals the real, essential Isabella Tyson, devoid of all her pretences and accoutrements of social status.
We are left to wonder whether this is the first time the narrator has witnessed the mirror’s effect upon Isabella, or is it a regular occurrence? Is this why the visitor remains seated on the drawing room sofa throughout the story, because this is the best vantage point from which to observe Isabella’s transformation, of which she is presumably unaware.
I’ve started reading Hermione Lee’s biography of Virginia Woolf, and just today came to p. 123 where the author discusses some of the troubling and unhappy associations that mirrors held for VW throughout her life. First, there was an incident which took place when young Virginia was looking at herself in a hallway mirror at home one day. For some reason, she suddenly felt such shame and guilt that she remembered the sensation for the rest of her life, and always referred to it as “the looking-glass shame.”
The adult VW speculated that her reaction was the result of some lingering Puritan influence in her background that was shamed by giving in to the sin of vanity and looking at herself in a mirror. It was also around this time that VW had a dreamlike experience, in which she was looking in a mirror when suddenly “a horrible face” appeared over her shoulder. Without going into detail, Lee’s biography also relates that VW’s “looking-glass shame” became interwoven in her mind with the shame of being sexually molested by her older half-brother, Gerald Duckworth, when she was six-years-old. So, perhaps in VW’s mind, the idea took hold of mirrors being associated, not with one’s external appearance, but as objects that burned away our outer selves to reveal the real person underneath, with all their inner shame and guilt.
Thank you for this Tom. I really enjoyed reading your comment and your detailed reading of the story and VW's relationship to mirrors. Yes, I really took the narrator to be an other-worldly figure (perhaps, as Ronald suggested, a manifestation of the novelist) because of the factors you mention - the weirdness of her sitting in Isabella's drawing room for an extended period while Isabella is out in the garden. It doesn't seem quite real.
I loved your idea that 'mirrors keep their owners under constant surveillance.' And also that mirrors are not 'passive reflectors of the world.'
I've only dipped into bits of Hermoine Lee's biography at this point so I didn't know about VW's unhappy associations with mirrors. How interesting!
I think none of us looks very good in the hairdresser's mirror - I maintain that the hairdresser's smock does us a disservice!!
Thanks for your kind words, Tash! As far as mirrors go, there's all that lore about magic mirrors, and vampires not casting a reflection, and so on. I also wondered whether the narrator's observations of things seeming to move in the drawing room, where "nothing stayed the same for two seconds together", might have been drawn from VW's own visual experiences during her periods of mental breakdown.
I loved this conversation. Tash, you gave us the option to just listen without reading the story first, and being lazy that's what I did, but afterwards was moved to read it anyway. A wonderful story, and much improved, for me, by your chat with Ronald.
Ahh, the imagination—always getting up to mischief :) What a wonderful conversation with Ronald, and a great short story by Virginia Woolf. I enjoyed it immensely. Thank you, Tash!