Katherine Mansfield--"The Fly"

Question to consider:  Although the story “The Fly” never overtly mentions World War I, make a list of details which indicate that the story is related to WW I and takes place shortly thereafter.

Although World War 1 is never overtly mentioned in the text, when one takes the story and puts it into its historical context, such an interpretation would make sense.
Indeed, the story was written in 1922, only four years after the end of the First World War that took Mansfield's brother. Similarly, every character in "The Fly" has experienced a loss of some kind. Mr. Woodfield has lost a person named Reggie, possibly his son, as his daughters went to visit his grave, and the Boss also lost his son. Evidently, one of the major themes of the story is loss, and how people deal with it. Most importantly, the story analyses how the boss deals with this loss, as he feels more resentment than sadness towards his son.

The fact that he has never even visited the grave shows his inability to deal with his loss. Also, he finds himself unable to cry, when the memory of his son surfaces. The boy was his only son and the Boss had worked his entire life, building up a business for him: "It had no other meaning if it was not for the boy. Life itself had come to no other meaning." I think that the boss feels resentment towards his son for dying in the war and not living long enough to fulfill his fathers dream. There is also a psychological analysis of various ways that people have to deal with loss. Some people transform their sadness into anger, making it easier to deal with the pain, a stage that Mansfield may have gone through herself when losing her brother with whom she was very close with.

The boss quickly turns his attention to a fly that is resting on his desk, and spends the rest of the story dropping ink on it, until it dies. In my opinion, this symbolizes various things. The fly represents the bosses son. He challenges the fly the same way his son was challeneged by the war. He drops four ink drops on the fly, one drop of ink per year of war, and watches as the fly fully recovers the first time, struggles slightly the second time, even more the third time and finally dies with the fourth drop of ink. At first the Boss admires the fly's courage: "He's a plucky little devil, thought the boss, and he felt a real admiration for the fly's courage. That was the way to tackle things; that was the right spirit. Never say die." But with the final drop, the boss is seized with anger as he watches the fly give in and die. He is angry at the fly for not standing up to the challenges he is facing, just how he is angry at his son for getting killed in the war. But after the episode of the fly, the Boss can no longer remember what he was thinking about: "He fell to wondering what it was he had been thinking about before. (...) For the life of him he could not remember." The boss tested the fly's limits and relates to it in the sense that he himself is being tested by his son's memories.

This interpretation can also be seen at a larger scale however. The Boss symbolizes the authority, the leader. Most of the time, a boss pushes the papers but doesn't get his hands dirty. By choosing this particular job for the character, Mansfield is representing the leaders behind the war. The fact that the Boss cannot cry at the memory of his son represents the numbness that has fallen over the leaders and the people, at the consequences of the war, the destruction it caused and the huge losses of men. When the war was over, the damaged countries were so occupied with reconstructing themselves that the people who had died and the entire reason behind the war seemed to have taken a backstage role. The son represents those that have fallen during the war, the lost generation, whereas the fly is symbol of Europe. With each year, Europe had more and more trouble recovering until it's economy finally completely collapsed, mirroring the fly's struggle with recovering from each drop of ink. This symbolism is enhanced by the fact that the boss and the son are not named, allowing them to take on the faces, and speak for many people.

Woodfield is the only character that has a name in the story, and the similarity between Woodfield and Mansfield could lead one to believe that the author desired to put herself into this story. After all, this story is also about her traumatizing loss. Woodfield triggers the entire resurfacing of the memory of the son's death as he tells the boss how his daughters came across his grave. He triggered emotions in the Boss that he had not felt in a long time, however, the man is unable to weep. I think that Mansfield is making it a point that one cannot forget the fallen ones. She wants us to remember.

I think the sons photograph also represents a connection with World War One. The boss describes his son's expression as "unnatural. It was cold, even stern-looking. The boy had never looked like that." I think this reflects what the war did to these young men that left home to fight. They were engaging in such brutal acts that they lost their humanity. The description of the boy's photo reminds me of the priest's speech in "Joyeux Noël" when he is telling the soldiers to kill the enemy like they are not sons of God. Taking the humanity out of these men is what allowed them to keep fighting and to kill all those men. It is much easier to pull the trigger on an evil person than someone you may have someone in common with. I think Mansfield is making a point here. The soldier is not who she thinks we should remember, but the person behind that cold expression, before the war robbed them of their humanity.