Laura Brown: Ace of Cakes

Laura Brown may appear to be your run-of-the-mill house wife and mother, but there are more layers to her than the cake she makes a disastrous attempt at making for her husband’s birthday. Similar to many of the women in her generation, Laura married at a rather young age and had a child soon after. She feels fortunate for her loving family, but begins to feel trapped and suffocated in her domestic reality. She is discontent with the simple, mundane tasks that fill her days, and is desperate to find some sort of creative outlet, even though she is by no means an “artist.” By baking a birthday cake for her husband, it’s almost as if Laura is channeling her restricted creativity by treating the cake as a beloved work of art. This is why she is so distraught when the cake does not turn out- she is frustrated that it has failed to live up to her expectations, and fears that she won’t live up to others’ expectations of her.
For Laura, this birthday cake symbolizes her need to fulfill the desire she has to play a meaningful role in life, even if it is only within the domestic sphere. She is dissatisfied with the first cake she bakes and throws it out, hoping her second attempt will bring success. Although she is more pleased with the way the second cake turns out, she is filled with disappointment when it is “ruined” by Richard, who accidentally spits on it while blowing out the candles. This shows that Laura’s quest for creative satisfaction and purpose is a never-ending one, because she feels trapped and cannot find an acceptable escape. No matter how desperately she tries to find happiness in her domestic role…
“The ‘y’ in ‘Happy’ isn’t what she’d hoped it would be, and two of the roses are lopsided.”

More Than Just An 'Echo'

It has become quite apparent that one of the main themes of E.M. Forster’s “A Passage to India,” is the concept of cultural misunderstanding. At the root of all the tension and miscommunication between the Indians and the Anglo-Indians in the novel is the difference in expectation regarding ideas about social propriety, religious beliefs and practices, and conflicting ideals about hospitality and acceptance between and among cultural communities. These repeated misunderstandings have the potential to progress into hardened cultural stereotypes which can become destructive, isolating barriers, and Forster demonstrates this time after time in his novel. For instance, when Aziz offers Fielding his collar studs in a genuine attempt at friendship, Ronny later sees Aziz’s missing stud and misinterprets it as a sloppy oversight, generalizing : "...there you have the Indian all over: inattention to detail; the fundamental slackness that reveals the race" (82). It is this type of misunderstanding in the novel which may seem harmless enough by itself, but actually contributes to a progressively widening cultural gap between the Indians and the Anglo-Indians that ultimately culminates in profound emotional and psychological damages that go far beyond the realm of repair.
One of the most important and symbolic relationships in the novel is the one between Dr. Aziz and Mrs. Moore. Their friendship is free of racial boundaries and cultural barriers, and the respect they show for one another is truly genuine. Although Mrs. Moore never comes right out and says that she is against the English colonial powers being in India, she admonishes Ronny for his stubborn attitude regarding the Indians. She asks him why they cannot be more pleasant to the natives and when he replies that it is not their purpose to be “pleasant” she boldly tells him that “India is part of the earth. And God has put us on the earth in order to be pleasant to each other. God…is…love” (53).
Although Mrs. Moore is revered by Aziz and many of the other Indians due to the respect she never fails to show them, she becomes afflicted by something in India that she can’t quite put her finger on at first, but that continues to erode away her personal beliefs, faith and compassion. This affliction is symbolized by the echo that she hears in the Marabar Caves, and continues to hear throughout the novel. The caves and their ‘echo’ are symbolic of the vast and enigmatic “muddle” of India- a land that the English can neither learn to understand nor appreciate, no matter how hard some of them may think they are trying.
Mrs. Moore first hears the echo at the Marabar Caves, and continues to be haunted by it for weeks to come. It encourages her to reflect upon her own ideals and beliefs regarding her religion, Christianity. Being exposed to the beliefs of both Hinduism and Islam during her stay in India causes her to re-examine her entire belief system and critically question its meaning and value. The ‘echo’ that continues to plague her until her death is symbolic of the culmination of events that ultimately causes her to abandon all of the beliefs, ideals, and relationships that she once lived for. Mrs. Moore’s personal battle with the sound of the ‘echo’ in her head that she cannot escape is representative of the struggle that so many of us are familiar with- accepting the different and the unknown.

Roger Fry in the Public Eye

Not only was Roger Fry a respected and renowned artist and art critic, but above all, he was an avid advocate for the type of art that he classified as “Post-Impressionism.” He had a profound impact on the art world in England during the early 1900s and was one of the first people to raise public awareness of modern art. In 1910 he organized the first Post-Impressionist Exhibition in London, putting together a show of impressionist painters that had remained rather hidden from the public eye up until that time. Fry’s exhibition featured the works of Cezanne, Van Gogh, Gauguin, Manet, Matisse, and Picasso, and rejected impressionism as old-fashioned. This exhibition shocked the public, evoking extreme emotional responses from its audience. Among the descriptive reactions of the exhibit’s observers were words like “horror,” “madness,” “evil,” “sickness of the soul,” and “pornography.” Needless to say, many people found the exhibition rather offensive. 

Bracing himself for yet another round of harsh criticism, Fry organized a second exhibition two short years later in 1912. This second Post-Impressionist Exhibition featured the artwork of some of the members of the Bloomsbury Group (whom Fry was personal friends with), including Vanessa Bell and Duncan Grant. Fry wrote his contribution, ‘Art and Socialism,’ to an anthology of essays being put together by H.G. Wells called ‘Socialism and the Great State,’ only a few months before this second exhibition was to take place.

           In his essay, Fry explores the negative effects that plutocracy has had on art and the artist who creates it. He emphasizes the importance of aesthetic vision, which he believes is the prerogative of the artist and the artist alone. He bemoans the fact that the wealthy and elite members of society alone have established what gives art “value,” and argues that the artist must have freedom from these conventions and rules in order to create anything of actual meaning. He goes on to say that in order for the artist to operate freely, he must be released from all financial restraints and other psychological pressures that society has put on him. Basically, what Fry describes in ‘Art and Socialism,’ is, in his opinion, the ideal conditions for the creation of art.  Roger Fry is responsible for bringing the art of the Post-Impressionism movement to the public, and will always be remembered for this profoundly significant contribution to the artistic community.

These are some paintings that are characteristic of the Post-Impressionistic art Fry advocated so fiercely:

"Starry Night Over the Rhone," Vincent Van Gogh

"Mahana no atua" (Day of God), Gauguin

"Icarus," Henri Matisse

Bloomsury Group: A Circle of Friends Who Lived in Squares and Loved in Triangles

Bibliography

Duncan Grant and Angelica Bell. Photograph. Tate Archive. Tate Archive Research Services. Web. 26 Sept. 2009. .

Clive and Angelica Bell. Photograph. Tate Archive. Tate Archive Research Services. Web. 26 Sept. 2009.


Fry, Roger. "Letter from Rogery Fry to Vanessa Bell." Letter. 11 June 1917. Tate Archive Research Services. Tate Archives. Web. 24 Sept. 2009. .

S. P. Rosenbaum, ‘Strachey, (Giles) Lytton (1880–1932)’, Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, Oxford University Press, Sept 2004; online edn, Jan 2008 [http://www.oxforddnb.com.ezproxy.tcu.edu/view/article/36338, accessed 29 Sept 2009]

Smith, Victoria L. ""Ransacking the Language:" Finding the Missing Goods in Virginia Woolf's Orlando." Journal of Modern Literature. Print.

A Harmless Sibling Rivalry?

Vanessa wrote “Notes on Virginia’s Childhood” shortly after her sister’s tragic suicide. Primarily written for their close family and friends, the memoir both celebrates and criticizes (though rather indirectly) the struggles and experiences that ultimately shaped Virginia, not only as a writer, but as a sister.

Through this memoir, Vanessa begins to reveal the dynamic of the relationship between her and her sister, which seemed to have been established early on in their childhood. As is the case in any family, each sister had their “role” within the Stephen clan. Vanessa, being the oldest sibling, personified maternal instinct. Virginia, on the other hand, often threw caution to the wind, knowing Vanessa would always be following close behind, ready and willing to pick up the pieces if need be. Vanessa writes about Virginia’s ability to create “an atmosphere of tense thundery gloom” when something didn’t go her way, and she also points out that she was the sibling that was always impacted the most significantly by those outbursts. Throw into the mix the fact that Virginia was prettier and more intelligent than Vanessa, and it becomes easy to see why Vanessa harbored some resentment toward her sister.

In this memoir, Vanessa makes sure to point out that she doesn’t “remember being jealous” of Virginia’s beauty, brilliance, or the ease with which she was able to interact with her elders. Obviously, Vanessa has some serious issues with selective memory. And we don’t even have to assume this, because she subtly hints at it throughout the entire memoir. She recalls instances in which her father’s friend, James Russell Lowell, would give all of the children coins from his purse, and Virginia would always get twice as much as the others. Once, he even gave her bird, which had the others beside themselves with jealousy. So, it is no big surprise that Vanessa envied her sister. If your younger sibling was more attractive than you, smarter than you, and more popular among your relatives than you, you’d be jealous too!

In all fairness, I do not think it can be said that jealousy was at the heart of this passionate and competitive sisterhood. Vanessa and Virginia were obviously very devoted to one another, beloved allies in the face of grave hardships including the death of their younger brother and Virginia’s bouts of mental illness that haunted her throughout her adulthood. They were intensely competitive, but due to their extremely different talents and personalities, these sisters were able to excel in different spheres of their personal and professional lives, allowing for a beautiful coexistence.

About Me!

• My name is Anne Pennebaker, and I am a senior here at TCU! I grew up in Fort Worth and have been a TCU horned frogs fan my WHOLE life! I am a biology major and a chemistry/psychology double minor. I am taking the LSAT in September and hopefully next year around this time I will be entering law school. Some day I hope to practice health law.