The Children's Hour

“Aunt Lily, the amount of disconnected unpleasantness that goes on in your head could keep a psychologist busy for years.”

In response to Mrs. Mortar’s insinuation that Joe’s presence in the house always ruins Martha’s day, Martha discredits her aunt. She claims that Mrs. Mortar constantly finds unpleasantness where there is none. Martha’s insult indicates that her aunt has potentially hit a nerve and noticed something that Martha believed was surreptitious. Regardless of whether her dislike of Joe stems from an attraction to Karen, Martha is undeniably hostile to him.

“You’re fonder of Karen, and I know that. And it’s unnatural, just as unnatural as it can be. You don’t like their being together. You were always like that even as a child. If you had a girl friend, you always got mad when she liked anybody else.”

Mrs. Mortar’s accusation, which becomes foundational in the case against Karen and Martha, occurs in a moment when the woman is lashing out at her niece, attempting to hurt her because Martha has asked her to leave the school. However, her claim that Martha being overprotective of her female friendships indicates an “unnatural” affection is what Martha might call “disconnected unpleasantness” (19). Although Martha states in the third act that she does feel the love she is accused of feeling for Karen, Mrs. Mortar’s accusations are unfounded and essentially meant to be mean. This claim is subtly threatening Martha, who doesn’t have a chance to remove Mrs. Mortar from the school because the school closes.

“You know, it’s really bad having you around children. […] When you’re at your best, you’re not for tender ears.”

This statement becomes ironic, as Martha is correct that Mrs. Mortar isn’t safe to have around children. Mrs. Mortar has no sense of discretion, and if she loves her niece, she does not care enough about her to protect her or to put Martha before herself. Of course, it is Martha who is publicly deemed unsafe to have around children. But Mrs. Mortar, who closes her eyes during lessons, instead of teaching, and has students read Shakespeare for her own entertainment, rather than their education, is a poor teacher, unlike her niece.

“You can look at Aunt Amelia and tell: old New England stock; never married out of Boston; still thinks honor is honor and dinner’s at eight thirty. Yes, ma’am, we’re a proud old breed.”

Joe’s assessment of his aunt and Mary’s grandmother, Mrs. Tilford, sets her up as rigid while subtly questioning her sexuality. Mrs. Tilford never married out of Boston, although Mary’s existence suggests that she had a child. The real child in the 1810 Scottish trial, Jane Cummings, was a child of unmarried parents. If Martha’s realization that she never loved a man indicates that she may be a lesbian, Mrs. Tilford’s unconscious sexuality might also be called into question. Her response, in which she professes to know for certain that Mary’s claims are true, implies an autonomous, fearful reaction. Mrs. Tilford is socially powerful and has conformed inflexibly to the identity expected of a matriarch in her position. Whether she has any hidden same-sex attraction, the play makes it clear that unmarried women are vulnerable to such accusations. If Mrs. Tilford responded to Mary’s accusations by siding with the headmistresses, she would open herself up to similar claims.

“You stay around kids long enough and you won’t know what to take seriously, either.”

When Joe tells Martha that she’s taking Mary too seriously, Martha’s response implies that he’s right and her seriousness is just a loss of perspective from too much time with children. However, this is ironic because Mary’s deception and self-serving treachery has very serious consequences for Martha and Karen. Joe implies children do not have the power to cause real problems, but Mary’s ability to manipulate and bully is very mature. Simultaneously, the play warns that children ought not to be taken too seriously. Mrs. Tilford takes Mary’s story seriously, and two women are condemned based on the words of children.

“It’s funny, because everybody gets married.”

Peggy does not understand the implications of what she and Evelyn overheard Mrs. Mortar saying. Mary responds by countering that some people don’t marry because they are ugly, choosing not to educate her friends about other reasons that women might opt not to marry. Peggy’s comment shows the social expectations that she has been raised to believe: that women are meant to get married. Her life’s aspiration is to marry a lighthouse keeper, despite the fact that she has before her role models of women who have become teachers, headmistresses, and actresses.

“Don’t think you’re fooling me, young lady. You might pull the wool over some people’s eyes, but—I bet you’ve been up to something again. Well, you wait right here till I tell your grandmother. And if you feel so sick, you certainly won’t want any dinner. A good dose of rhubarb and soda will fix you up.”

Agatha, the maid, knows that Mary’s lies are not simply childish exaggeration, as Mrs. Tilford treats Mary’s claims about her heart and punishments at school. Agatha has the perspective of watching Mary grow up and develop into a deceitful teen. She does not entertain the claims that Mary is ill, suggesting an unpleasant remedy instead of dinner, which Mary is undoubtedly hungry for after her long journey to the house. Agatha’s threats are empty, however, since Mary certainly gets dinner and does not seem to receive any rhubarb and soda. In the third act, when Agatha swears that she always believed Martha and Karen, it is clear that she has no real power in the household, although she is allowed to speak to Mary as an adult speaking to a child, rather than as a servant speaking to the heir of the house.

“Grandma! Please! I can’t go back! I can’t! They’ll kill me! They will, Grandma! They’ll kill me!”

Before leaving school, Mary told Evelyn and Peggy that she would invent a reason for leaving school to tell her grandmother, boasting, “I can always do it better on the spur of the moment” (28). As Mrs. Tilford picks up the phone to call the school, Mary tries desperately to form a convincing lie and yells the most overly dramatic answer possible. Her ridiculous claim shows that Mary has no clue what she will say at this point to persuade her grandmother to let her stay. She did not come home with the intention of accusing the two headmistresses of having a lesbian relationship, but on the fly, she fits the lies around a center of truth. The claim that the two women will kill her is extremely childish. Although Mary meddles in adult lives, she is in a liminal space between childhood and adulthood.

“My heart—I had a pain in my heart. I couldn’t help having a pain in my heart, and when I fainted right in class, they called Cousin Joe and he said I didn’t.”

Mary admits that her cousin found nothing wrong with her upon examination, but she does not release the claim that she was legitimately sick. Throughout the play, Mary lies uncontrollably, but she never admits to lying, even when she is undeniably caught. While Joe’s cursory exam might not have revealed every potential health issue that would cause heart pain, which lends credibility to her continuation of the lie, she also refuses to give up her lies, even when they are proven false. When Karen reveals that she saw Mary’s flowers in the trash and gives her the chance to tell the truth, Mary staunchly stands by her lie. Her stubbornness in maintaining her lie about Martha and Karen, even on the cusp of potential disaster, shows that Mary is self-centered and immature, unable or unwilling to weigh the potential pros and cons of keeping the lie.

“You don’t love me. You don’t care whether they kill me or not.”

The childishness of Mary’s accusation of her grandmother speaks to her immaturity, even as she manipulates events that have very real consequences for adults. Angry children often tell their guardians that they hate them, or assert that their parents don’t love them in an effort to get what they want. An adult understands that the headmistresses are certainly not going to kill Mary, even if punishments feel so harsh to a child that they seem deadly. Notably, Mrs. Tilford is not convinced enough by this claim to give in, as much as she has spoiled Mary, although Mrs. Tilford does seem moved by the accusation.

“For a little girl, you’re imagining a lot of big things. Why should they be scared of me? Am I such an unpleasant old lady?”

Mrs. Tilford is viewing her granddaughter as a child and ignoring the fact that she is fourteen and approaching adulthood. Mary is long past the age of imagining that something frightening is happening and is old enough to manipulate the truth. In a way, Mary is correct that Martha and Karen are afraid of Mrs. Tilford, as Mrs. Tilford is a powerful woman and neither headmistress wants to approach her about her granddaughter’s behavior. But to Mary, Mrs. Tilford presents herself simply as a grandmother, an old lady who is kind to Mary. Mary’s suggestion that Martha and Karen are afraid of her implies that Mary sees something worth fearing in her grandmother.

“There’s not necessarily anything wrong with people having secrets.”

Mrs. Tilford’s assertion is telling. There’s not necessarily anything wrong with people having secrets, but some secrets are wrong. If Martha and Karen are acting on same-sex attraction in the vicinity of children, their secret becomes a problem, as far as Mrs. Tilford is concerned. This statement implies that she, too, might also have secrets that are no one else’s business. It also shows that Mrs. Tilford views her granddaughter as a child who sees things that she does not understand.

“But that’s what she said, Grandma. She said it was unnatural for a girl to feel that way.”

Mary’s use of the word “unnatural” (37), while repeated from Mrs. Mortar’s claim, shows that she knows what she is suggesting to her grandmother. It is a code word that she wouldn’t otherwise know. Mrs. Tilford’s presumption that Mary is too young to know such a code word helps bolster her decision to believe Mary’s story.

“Well, a lot of things I don’t understand. But it’s awful, and sometimes they fight and then they make up, and Miss Dobie cries and Miss Wright gets mad, and then they make up again, and there are funny noises and we get scared.”

Mary, who has just finished reading an erotic novel, knows exactly what she is implying by claiming to hear “funny noises” (39). Mary is playing on her grandmother’s presumption of her innocence. Saying that the noises scared her and her schoolmates is exactly the sort of language that would spur a homophobic panic. Not only are they having a relationship that they aren’t carefully hiding, but they are scaring the children with it. When Mrs. Tilford finally grasps what Mary is saying, she becomes horrified enough to believe the lie fully. Much like Mary’s claim about heart pain, an assertion of lesbians among the schoolgirls cannot be ignored or dismissed.

“You’ll act like a lady for once in your life.”

Agatha acts like a powerless, surrogate parent to Mary, offering the discipline that Mrs. Tilford does not dispense. She recognizes that Mary is spoiled and selfish and has the potential to be harmful. Ordering Mary to “act like a lady” (41) has no effect, as Mary instead acts like a bully. Mary performs propriety only when she needs to convince an adult that she is blameless. Similarly, when she is called out of bed to answer for the lies she told, she affects a sweet, deferent, childlike manner.

“Try to understand this: you’re not playing with paper dolls. We’re human beings, see? It’s our lives you’re fooling with. Our lives. That’s serious business for us. Can you understand that?”

By saying this to Mrs. Tilford, Martha suggests that Mary does not fully understand what it means to ruin two adult lives. She compares them to paper dolls, a crafting pastime for little girls. Whether or not Mary entirely understands how evil her actions are, she does not seem to care to understand. Mary is stubborn and refuses to acknowledge that actions have consequences beyond authoritative punishment. When Mary breaks the vase in Act I, she shows a quick flash of fear before insisting that she doesn’t care if she gets in trouble. In actuality, Mary becomes incensed when she is punished, since her grandmother apparently does not punish her much. In response to being disciplined for skipping class and lying about it, she leaves the school, hikes and hitchhikes home, and tells lies that ruin multiple lives and destroy a school.

“I have done what I had to do. What they are may possibly be their own business. It becomes a great deal more than that when children are involved.”

Mrs. Tilford invokes the innocence of children as a reason for accepting Mary’s claims without question. Like heart attacks, the innocence of children must be taken seriously. She justifies her premature strike against the two women. After the fact, she tells Karen, Martha, and Joe that she knows for sure that she is right, although she has absolutely no reason to be so sure. Even before Mary forces Rosalie to lie, Mrs. Tilford has acted upon the stories of a girl who lies and exaggerates. The children must be removed immediately, just in case the two women are actually having an affair. Once Mrs. Tilford has set their downfall in motion, she must insist that she did the right thing. She also suggests that the only reason that a person deserves to be exposed for a same-sex relationship is proximity to children.

“Righteousness is a great thing.”

Joe accuses Mrs. Tilford of self-righteousness, as she stands in judgment of what she believes Martha and Karen have done. The righteousness that Joe attributes to his aunt is empty, proud, and unfounded. She is relying on her own self-importance to justify the action she has taken against the two women. In Mrs. Tilford’s righteousness, she refuses to consider that she might have made the wrong choice. She will not give the two women, to whom she has been kind, the benefit of the doubt or even the benefit of questioning. Mrs. Tilford reacted and has damaged their reputations.

“We’ve been sitting here for eight days asking each other the time. Haven’t you heard? There isn’t time anymore.”

In the first act, the school bell rings to signal the end of the period. Time is structured in a school. The hours, days, and weeks are carefully divided, and time passes in a meaningful way. Compared to this structure, the shuttered school is a timeless place. The only way the women mark time is by imposing events, such as bath time, Joe’s daily arrival, or bedtime. Martha suggests that Karen find such an event to look forward to each day to give her some of the structure she has lost. This understanding of time mimics the limbo of their lives, in which they own a school that cannot attract children. They have nowhere to go and nothing to do. In the eight days since they lost the libel case, they have had the meaning in their lives destroyed. Wallowing in their fear and depression, neither woman has begun to rebuild or find new meaning.

“There must never be anything wrong between you and Joe. Never.”

Martha, who did not want to accept her friend’s marriage to Joe, has changed her tune. In Act III, when Martha and Karen’s alleged relationship has become common knowledge, Joe and Karen’s wedding will theoretically serve as proof that the accusations were unfounded. For Martha, who has been ruminating on the accusations and discovering her own potential sexuality, Karen’s marriage will cut off any possibility that she will act upon the desires that she is naming for the first time. Martha does not admit her feelings to Karen until Karen insists that her relationship with Joe is no longer a possibility. Martha clings to their relationship, which will also become evidence that the love she feels for Karen is only in her imagination. Once Karen is no longer attached, Martha must face her attraction, which leads her to kill herself.

“I was on tour; that’s a moral obligation, you know.”

Ironically, Mrs. Mortar claims to have a moral obligation to her theater tour but does not acknowledge that her moral obligation to her niece should have overridden her promise to the tour. Mrs. Mortar’s angry words gave Mary ammunition against Karen and Martha, spurring the entire event that ruined their lives. Morally, Mrs. Mortar should have defended her niece, even if that meant claiming that she did not suspect something that she did indeed suspect. This instance clarifies Martha’s animosity toward her aunt. While Mrs. Mortar was mostly ridiculous in Act I, her cowardice in refusing to take her niece’s side makes her abhorrent. Once Martha and Karen have been accused of having a same-sex relationship, unmarried women like her aunt and Mrs. Tilford separate themselves from the two women.

“Because I hate you. I’ve always hated you.”

Martha’s angry words toward her aunt mirror Mary’s childish claim that her grandmother doesn’t love her. However, although the words have the potential for childishness—after all, many furious children claim to hate their parents—they have the full weight of Martha’s adulthood. Martha, who deserved a guardian as a child, received a self-centered woman who was more interested in self-aggrandizement than helping her. When she accuses Martha of loving her female friends too much, she betrays her and then refuses to work to counteract the betrayal.

“And every word will have a new meaning. You think we’ll be able to run away from that? Woman, child, love, lawyer—no words that we can use in safety anymore. Sick, high-tragic people. That’s what we’ll be.”

Karen tells Joe that their lives together can never be what they would have been before Mary’s accusations. She is indicating a fundamental shift that has occurred, in which everything will have multiple meanings. She will not be able to use the words “woman, child, love, lawyer” (66) without also referring to the woman she supposedly loved, the children who were pulled from her school, or the lawyer who defended her. Although time might allow the trauma of the events to fade, Karen claims they will never be entirely free of it.