The Fly
By Katherine Mansfield
An essay on modernist convention and cultural entomology
Jeremy P. Chapman
3726223
Prof. M. Foster
Kathleen Mansfield Beauchamp (1888-1923), whose nom-de-plume was Katherine Mansfield, was born in New Zealand and was educated at Queen's college in London. She is known primarily as a writer of short stories, and is generally acknowledged as one of the finest writers of her period. Her short story The Fly, at a little more than five pages certainly qualifies as a short story. It deals with a character only referred to as "the boss" having a meeting with Mr. Woodifield. As the meeting progresses, Mansfield allows glimpses into the pasts of the two men, and hints at their motivations and concerns. The question this discussion centers on is the fly itself: what significance does the fly hold to both the reader and the characters, and why is the fly killed by "the boss"? In order to answer these questions, we must explore the significance of the fly in a historical, mythical and symbolic manner, as well as examining the boss' motivations and interactions with this winged beast.
Historically, flies have been regarded
as lowly, dirty, evil insects. They are the carriers of disease, the unclean scavengers
of other animal's excrement, and the pests to end all pests. In Greek mythology
the fly is represented variously as a messenger from the gods, a pest sent from
the gods, an omen or a blessing. For instance, Hera sends a gadfly to pursue Io
up and down the coast of Ionia (now Asia Minor) in a vain attempt at preventing
the birth of Io's son, who was fathered by Zeus. In the bible, insects are generally
seen as malign but annoying pests that hold symbolic weight that is used to illustrate
morals and fables. For instance, in Ecclesiastes 10:1 we are told "Dead flies
make a perfumer's oil stink, so a little foolishness is weightier than wisdom
and honour." (1)
. Here we see the fly as a spoiling
agent for a sweet-smelling perfume, a precursor of the modern-day "fly in the
ointment". The fly in the biblical instance also embodies the human trait of "foolishness",
while perfume becomes "wisdom and honour". The much maligned fly becomes once
again the symbol for rot and impurity. On the other side, in Isaiah 7:18 the fly
takes on another role altogether, becoming a messenger for the Lord: " And it
will come about in that day, that the Lord will whistle for the fly that is in
the remotest part of the rivers of Egypt, and for the bee that is in the land
of Assyria." (2)
. Cultural entomology has made many
connections between the arts and the insect world, and in most cases the insect
plays a double role: that of an almost mystical closeness to nature, and that
of a bane to most other life forms. In The Fly, this ubiquitous insect
plays such a role; it symbolizes through its connotations an antagonist, something
that it is right to kill, a lower life form; however, the moral of the story
hinges on the fact that the fly is only a part of nature, a part of our collective
cultural and environmental ecosystem, and perhaps also closer to mother nature
than humanity itself. There are many references to flies in the venerable Aesop's
Fables that illustrate the cultural views found in literature. Two that do well
to show the bipolar attitudes toward insects spotlighted by cultural entomology
are The Flies and the Honey-Pot and The Bald Man and the Fly
reproduced here due to their brevity. In the first fable, flies are once again
"foolish creatures", and now they have the added stigma of being greedy also.
The boss would benefit greatly from reading this moral tale for he embarks on
a similar venture of painful pleasure in the drowning of the fly. The second
passage reminds us of literature's contempt for the fly, and the piteous regard
we hold it in. The
Flies and the Honey-Pot A NUMBER of Flies were attracted
to a jar of honey which had been overturned in a housekeeper's room, and placing
their feet in it, ate greedily. Their feet, however, became so smeared with
the honey that they could not use their wings, nor release themselves, and were
suffocated. Just as they were expiring, they exclaimed, "O foolish creatures
that we are, for the sake of a little pleasure we have destroyed ourselves."
Pleasure bought with pains, hurts. A FLY bit the bare head of a Bald
Man who, endeavouring to destroy it, gave himself a heavy slap. Escaping, the
Fly said mockingly, "You who have wished to revenge, even with death, the Prick
of a tiny insect, see what you have done to yourself to add insult to injury?"
The Bald Man replied, "I can easily make peace with myself, because I know there
was no intention to hurt. But you, an ill-favoured and contemptible insect who
delights in sucking human blood, I wish that I could have killed you even if
I had incurred a heavier penalty." (3) The boss is presented to the reader
as a person of very low self-esteem. At the beginning of his meeting with Mr.
Woodifield we are told "[The boss] was proud of his room; he liked to have it
admired, especially by old Woodifield. It gave him a feeling of deep, solid
satisfaction to be planted there in the midst of it in full view of that frail
old figure in the muffler."(p. 527 (4)). This
feeling of superiority the boss has toward Mr. Woodifield is symptomatic of
an instability in the boss's ego. He achieves his need to feel important by
belittling others. He is a man frustrated by loss and chance: his son, dead
six years now grieves him greatly, and Woodifield's mention that his girls had
visited "Reggie's grave"(p.599) combines to fill him with anger. Therefore,
to the boss, the fly serves as an outlet for grief and anger, because he " .
. . wasn't feeling as he wanted to feel."(p.601) when he thought about his dead
son. He acts out his frustration on the hapless fly that has landed in his inkwell,
saving it from drowning and then dowsing it repeatedly in ink until it stops
moving. This probably gives him a feeling similar to what he felt about Mr.
Woodifield's admiration at his newly decorated office, a feeling of superiority,
his overpowering force acting on an insignificant life force and triumphing.
His actions toward the fly have a larger significance in the context of the
story. The boss recounts how his hope that his son would take his place in the
office upon his retirement had been so near fruition, his hope only to be dashed
with his son's passing. Similarly, the fly is so close to being free, only to
be dowsed once more from that great unseen above. The reader of this story, imbued
with the cultural ideals attached to the fly, must understand the duality of
the fly's presence in literature. One would then see the killing of the fly
as a cruel act toward an innocent being, and at the same time a justifiable
killing given the circumstances of the act. The image of the fly spoiling the
perfume or being a fly in the ointment gives the reader further justification
for the condoning of this act. This method of distancing the reader from a violent
or morally objectionable happening by introducing extraneous material, such
as the dead son, the boss's ego problem and Mr. Woodifield's visit is a convention
of modernist literature. Hemingway uses such techniques in On the Quai at
Smyrna and In Our Time. Hemingway's tools for distancing were
similar to Mansfield's, a description of the action void of any mention of pain,
suffering or any other bad thought. The fly is "plucky"(p.601) and the boss
feels "a real admiration for the fly's courage"(p.601). There is no mention
of remorse or possible consequences to the boss's actions, one is steered toward
accepting the fly's death passively. This allows the author to spotlight the
circumstances that make this an acceptable act, the character's past and their
emotions. By concentrating our attention on these factors rather than simply
the fly's demise, Mansfield weaves a story that has a delayed impact; once the
shock of the final episode with the captive fly wears off, one considers the
authors' motivations in ending the story this way. In conclusion, the significance
of the fly is different yet similar to the reader and the characters. The boss's
killing of the fly is textually justified because of his son's death and Mr.
Woodifield's reminders about mortality; the reader is appalled at the treatment
of the fly in the context of general life; yet is aware of the symbolic significance
of the fly to themselves and to the characters; therefore the killing becomes
acceptable behaviour based on the prevailing circumstances. The modernist convention
of distancing a reader from objectionable material so that the reader feels
the full impact of the story only upon considering the base motive for the character's
actions is subtle. It can convey emotions that are inherent in every being,
but latent until an event such as the visit by Mr. Woodifield brings matters
to a head and one's emotional self takes over. Texts
Consulted Book:
The Short Stories of Katherine Mansfield, Katherine Mansfield Alfred A. Knopf, New York
1976 Book:
Dictionary of Mythology Wordsworth Reference W & R Chambers, Edinburgh 1991 Web
Site: http://www.fordham.edu/halsall/ancient/aesop-fables.html Web
Site:http://www.biblestudytools.net/OnlineStudyBible/bible.cgi?passage=isa+7:18 1. Web Site:
http://www.biblestudytools.net/OnlineStudyBible/bible.cgi?passage=ec+10:1 2. Web Site:
http://www.biblestudytools.net/OnlineStudyBible/bible.cgi?passage=isa+7:18
3. Web
Page:
http://www.fordham.edu/halsall/ancient/aesop-fables.html
4. Book:
The Short Stories of Katherine Mansfield
Alfred A. Knopf, New York 1976