Who Is The Protagonist In Miss Brill

“Miss Brill” In the short story of “Miss Brill” by Katherine Mansfield, Miss Brill is a lonely, old woman who sits in a park and waits for people to come near so she can listen in on their conversations. She becomes so caught up in the conversations of others and the world around her that it makes her forget about her own loneliness. But sadly, it also distorts the image she has of the world around her. The first encounter of this is in the beginning of the story when she pulls out the fur in the box and “rubbed the life back into the dim little eyes”. Miss Brill makes this inanimate object personified by giving it a voice when it says “What has been happening to me?”. This object is a key part in the story because she keeps it with her like her little “side-kick” because she has no one else to talk with. Because she has no one else to interact with, she feeds off of other people’s conversations, relationships, and behaviors. The little fur pelt symbolizes the only friend that she has.
When Miss Brill mentions the old couple that “shared her “special” seat”, she describes them “as though they’d just come from… cupboards” meaning they are like dishes in a cabinet that come out only every once in a while when they are needed. She thinks of this couple as old, forgotten people that only show up on Sunday’s for the band and to hear them play. But, it is ironic because at the end of the story, Miss Brill tells the reader that instead of going to the bakery, she goes home to “her room like a cupboard”, symbolizing that she is also like a dish in a cabinet, forgotten, and only comes out when