ssential state of being faded and reality intercepted. 3Surprise plays an important role in the plot only because if it weren’t for the fat bald man surprising Leila with reality, she would have never reached her epiphany. Theirs is foreshadowing throughout the play from the very beginning when Leila describes her place in the cab as being in her “own little corner of it”, and in the end of the play, I think she found her own little corner in the ballroom, and made a decision to perceive the world the way she wants to, and be “in her own little corner” of it. Mansfield uses flashbacks of Leila’s home life only to contrast the differences and similarities of the two environments.4 I found irony in the plot theme, whereas usually there’s a young boy who goes on a journey, and an older more mature woman gives the young boy a life lesson, causing him to have an epiphany, and she’s reflected in the story as being cold and dark. Nevertheless at the end of the story, he goes from being a young boy to a young man. In Her First Ball the roles are reversed and the author leaves it open to the author as to whether or not the main character actually reached an epiphany and reached a new level of maturity.8The main character narrates the story, and she’s reliable to me because the story is written both subjectively and objectively, and I feel as though it’s the closest thing to an unbiased opinion as possible. 9 The title is self - explanatory, Her First Ball is about a young woman going to her first ball and all of the experiences that coincide with it. Mansfield did an excellent job of portraying the perspective of a female experiencing a major stepping stone in her life, showing growth in the development of the character while the story develops, and leaving the ending open ended, because the reader decides for themselves the outcome of the situation. ...
