Analysis Of A New Dress By Virginia Woolf - 1013 Words

Short stories are not just stories that are short. Short stories are complex writings that most times portray the authors look on life. In 1944, an author named Virginia Woolf wrote the short story, A New Dress. This piece is an excellent example for showing the true elements of a short story. Character, point of view, setting, plot, motif, theme, and symbols are what make up a short story. In Woolf’s, A New Dress, most of these attributes are clearly laid out within the writing. This is not always the case for short stories. Virginias Woolf’s, The New Dress, is about a woman named Mabel Waring. She had bought and got tailored a new dress to wear to a fancy dinner party. She had found the dress in a Paris fashion magazine and deemed it†¦show more content†¦What a fright she looks! What a hideous new dress† (502). Not a single soul at the party said these phrases, but Mabel believes those are the words being spoken around her. The main theme of The New Dress is a woman’s insecurity. Although the theme of a short story may not always be clear and easy to decipher, Woolf makes the main character’s insecurity come forth from the beginning. In the very first sentence Mabel is looking in the mirror and pointing out all her flaws, â€Å"drawing her attention, perhaps rather markedly, to all the appliances for tidying and improving hair, complexion, clothes† (502). Mabel Waring represents a case of man versus himself. Her thoughts shown throughout the pages are negative and bring herself down. The theme of insecurity within The New Dress is not only shown through Mabel looking in the mirror. She compares herself to unattractive insects and higher class society members. Mabel begins to compare herself to an ugly house fly, â€Å"she was a fly, but the others were dragonflies, butterflies, beautiful insects† (504). At this point in the story Mabel Waring has made it clear she despises the look of not only her dress, but herself as well. She sees herself as this ugly, annoying creature that everyone detests, while all the other women in the room are beautiful, graceful beings. The fly is a symbol for how she feels within society,Show MoreRelatedAnalysis Of Who s Afraid Of Virginia Woolf1609 Words   |  7 Pages Analysis Who s Afraid of Virginia Woolf Edward Albee is a well known American was born in Virginia, he moved to New York to start his passion of writing plays and he wrote his first play which is The Zoo story, Albee then started to spend most of his time in the American University Theater. Albee became famous and received numerous amount of awards. 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