Time is a Healer In Katherine Mansfield’s short story “The Fly”, she tells of a man and his struggle with the loss of his son. The setting starts out in the boss’s office, where he is talking to a man we know as Mr. Woodifield. Mr. Woodifield is an older gentleman whom since he had a stroke his family keeps him boxed up in his home every day of the week, expect for Tuesdays. Mr. Woodifield and the boss talk about the new decorations of the boss’s office, there is something though that Mr. Woodifield struggles to remember that he wanted to tell the boss. He remembers that is was his daughters had ran across the boss’s son grave while looking at Reggie’s, his son whom he had lost in World War One, grave. He goes on to tell the boss of how well the place is kept, and how his son and Reggie were quite close to one another. After Mr. Woodifield leaves the boss tells his office messenger that “I’ll see nobody for half an hour.” He begins to attempt to grieve over the loss of his son the way he used to be able to. He finds himself unable to weep and he finds himself easily distracted by a simple fly. The fly falls into the ink pot and the boss watches him struggle over and over until he is finally unable to overcome and dies. The moral of this story seems to be that time can heal all grief. Mr. Woodifield is a gentleman whom was a former employee of the boss. He has retired after the stroke he had and comes to visit the boss on Tuesdays, when his wife and girls let him out of the house. Like the boss, he also lost his son in the war. Mr. Woodifield cannot seem to remember anything, until after having some whisky. “But it warmed him; it crept into his chilled old brain- he remembered.” (736) He is then able to remember about his sons grave and how that his Reggie and the boss’s son are close to one another in the cemetery. He does not get upset or have any signs of grief while talking about this to the boss. We can expect that at one point he grieved over the loss of his son, but time has helped him overcome it. The boss after many years is finally able to overcome his grief. When he first hears Woodifield speak of the grave he gets quiet and does not have anything to say. “Old Woodifield paused, but the boss made no reply. Only a quiver in his eyelids showed that he heard.” (736). The boss set up an hour after Mr. Woodifield leaves to be able to grieve over his son. His feelings are clearly stated to the reader “He wanted, he intended, he arranged to weep….” (737). This is the present condition of his grief. Time has conquered his grief. He wants to feel the pang of grief. As a last try, he decides to get up and have a look at his son’s photograph. However, a fly in the inkpot attracts his attention and he forgets about his son and the grief in a moment. He starts dropping drops of ink on the fly to enjoy its struggle. After the death of the fly, he tries to remember what he was thinking, but cannot. The last line of the story states “For the life of him he could not remember” (738). This clearly shows that time has conquered his grief.
The symbolism in this story is very strong. The fly is one of the main symbols I found. This is another way to the author shows us that the boss has overcome his grief. He gets so engulfed in the fly and he cannot remember what was on his mind before. He watches as the tries to dry his body of the ink and once the fly sees hope that “the horrible danger was over; it had escaped; it was ready for life again” (737) the boss drops another ink blot onto the fly to repeat the process all over again. After the continue drops of ink the fly no longer can survive and dies. “The boss lifted the corpse on the end of the paper-knife and flung it into the waste-paper basket.” (738) This gives us the idea of death to the boss is no longer such an issue. He has watched as the fly struggled time and time again, much like his son. Although he shows no grief to the fly. Once he tries to remember what he was thinking after his encounter with the fly, he cannot. “And while the old dog padded away he fell to wondering what it was he had been thinking about before. What was it? It was... He took out his handkerchief and passed it inside his collar. For the life of him he could not remember.” The fact that he could not even recall that he was grieving over his son is proof that time has helped him heal and he no longer is feeling the constant grief of his son’s death. This story is a very wonderful representation of how a writer can use settings, symbolism and characters to tell us a story. With the characters in this story we learn how each one of them deal with the loss of a son and how the healing of their grief is overcome. The symbols are clearly focused and are supporting details for what I believe the author is trying to teach the reader with this story. The boss is finally able after six years to stop grieving over the death of his son. Time is the great healer is shown very clearly in this story.