The Heat of the Day

In these early chapters, Bowen establishes The Experience and Limbo of Wartime through the setting of London during WWII. The opening description of the outdoor concert initially focuses on Londoners’ collective experience of darkness, the “feeling of sequestration, of emptiness the music had not had time to fill” (4) instead of immediately introducing any individual characters. Bowen recreates the experience of “people watching” as the unnamed narrator surveys and speculates on the crowd, including “pairs of lovers,” “[m]others tired by being mothers” and “elderly people” (5), emphasizing the social and communal nature of the experience. Throughout the novel, the narrative’s primary focus is on the intricacies of human interaction, both on a micro and macro scale, to show how the war affects people both individually and as a group. The narrative’s focus on the uncanny differences between pre-war and wartime life portray a collective experience of being in between states: of darkness and light (See: Symbols & Motifs), peace and war, normalcy and disruption.

As the first chapter progresses, the perspective switches from that of an omniscient narrator to that of Louie to introduce the theme of The Effect of War on Personal Relationships. While the narrator describes Louie and Harrison in the chapter, Louie is not named as a character until late in the chapter, and Harrison is not identified at all. Bowen therefore creates an atmosphere of anonymity and mystery, presenting a surreal blend of daily life in London and the threat of war. The dynamic between Louie and Harrison suggests the change that war has had on how people interact: Louie thinks about being lonely, and as a result continually tries to interact with Harrison, even though he is largely antagonistic toward her.

Bowen frequently uses gesture and movement to characterize individuals and add detail to how they interact with each other. For example, the first description of Harrison shows him “sat body bent forward, feet planted apart on the grass floor, elbows lodged on his knees, insistently thrusting the fist of his right hand against and into the open palm of his left” (6). Bowen immediately portrays Harrison as anxious, while his strange, specific movement with his fist hints at the more aggressive streak in his nature, which he will demonstrate in his blackmailing of Stella. Similarly, when he is rude to Louie, she “withdrew from the pocket her other hand in order to, self-protectively, fold her arms” (10), revealing the anxiety and vulnerability that Louie feels in wishing to connect with someone else.

Although the novel includes action and references to the ongoing war, its primary tension and source of suspense is how the characters relate to one another. This first section of the novel includes the introduction of the secret that drives the plot and the major characters’ actions: The insinuation that Robert is an enemy spy for Nazi Germany. Neither the reader nor Stella knows whether or not this is true until much later in the novel, when his treason is revealed. Bowen also sometimes introduces unexplained details and ambiguity into the narrative to heighten suspense, such as when Roderick finds a piece of paper in the pocket of Robert’s dressing gown and Stella tears it up. It is never made clear to the reader what that paper was. Thus, Bowen creates thriller-like tension and suspense through intricate social interactions rather than with major plot events.