52 pages • 1 hour read
Washington Square
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Symbols & Motifs
The Red Velvet Dress
As the narrator describes it, Catherine develops “a lively taste for dress” as a young adult (14). She seeks to be “eloquent in her garments, and to make up for her diffidence of speech by a fine frankness of costume” (14). Even Mrs. Almond remarks that Catherine dresses “so richly” that young men are somewhat fearful of her. Being shy and quiet, Catherine allows her clothing to speak for her, advertising her wealth, taste, and social class.
The most striking example of Catherine’s tastes comes in the form of a “red satin gown trimmed with gold fringe” (15). Catherine is wearing this dress when she meets Morris Townsend, and it most ostentatiously publicizes her wealth. While to Catherine, the red dress provides a means of self-expression, her father sees it as a symbol of vulgar affluence and, thus, ill-suited to his daughter, who he believes should be modest. It challenges his belief that a well-bred young woman “should not carry half her fortune on her back” (15). It doubtlessly also reminds him of his distaste for the “buckles, bugles, and pins” with which Mrs. Penniman adorns her dresses (17). He wants his daughter to be more sensible than his easily agitated sister.
Dr. Sloper teases her about the lavishness of her appearance, wondering if this “magnificent person” could be his child, after earlier declaring that her appearance is “so sumptuous, opulent, [and] expensive” that the casual onlooker would think she had a small fortune at her disposal (15). This passage leads directly to his suspicions about Townsend, as Mrs. Penniman proffers that Townsend admires Catherine’s dress. This statement foreshadows the truth about Townsend’s intentions toward Catherine and her money. Dr. Sloper doubtlessly hears it as proof of his point that Catherine is conveying more than she wishes by wearing the extravagant red satin dress. Townsend, too, understands that Catherine is carrying a portion of her fortune on her back, a fortune likely large enough to sustain such purchases and, therefore, pique his curiosity.
Washington Square
Dr. Sloper has the Washington Square house built as a quiet, genteel alternative to the bustle of New York City business. With its broad face open to Washington Square, along with its large balcony and extensive white marble, the house represents affluence, strength, and longevity, not opulence, grandeur, or individuality. In fact, the house “exactly resembled” the neighboring houses. The narrator notes that the neighborhood has “the look of having had something of a social history” (16), a look associated with the stability and propriety of old money rather than the fluctuating fortunes of the nouveau riche.
As a place of solidity and propriety, the Washington Square home is particularly ill-suited to Mrs. Penniman and her romantic machinations. When Townsend walks her home, Mrs. Penniman points out her window and directs Townsend to the side of the house where he might view Catherine’s bedroom windows—certainly, a breach of the propriety the house is supposed to guard against. She seems to expect Townsend to appear at the house again in the form of a love-struck Romeo pining for Juliet. When Townsend observes the windows he supposes to be Catherine’s, he is not irresistibly drawn to call up to his love. Instead, he walks back around to the front of the house, looks it up and down, and thinks it “a devilish comfortable house” (87). His interest rests in the house and what it represents in terms of social status and financial stability.
The house contrasts with both Mrs. Almond’s home, which is much “farther uptown, in an embryonic street with a high number—a region where the extension of the city began to assume a theoretic air,” and that of Mrs. Montgomery (17). Mrs. Montgomery’s home, though neat, clean, and freshly painted, strikes Dr. Sloper as a miniature house, a doll house that should have a place on a shelf. Neither residence possesses the gravitas of the Washington Square home. Though Catherine is advised she might be more comfortable living elsewhere following Dr. Sloper’s death, she remains in Washington Square, using its size as a buffer against too close a proximity to Mrs. Penniman. Like the opulent outfits she once wore, the large home represents Catherine’s character later in life: It serves as a mirror to her own solid, cool, quiet stoicism.
Decorum and Propriety
Much of the character development in Washington Square rests upon distinctions in the characters’ observance of decorum and propriety. Without this veneer of gentility, class status is destabilized, which is partially why Townsend’s manner is such a threat to Dr. Sloper. The narrator describes Dr. Sloper as a man with a “dread of vulgarity” (15), and the doctor’s judgments concerning his daughter, her suitor, and the doctors’ sisters revolve around his sense of propriety.
The respect and deference Catherine shows Dr. Sloper early in the novel fits his idea of the proper behavior of a devoted daughter. Indeed, through much of the novel, Catherine resists Townsend when he wishes to break down her sense of propriety and duty. When he senses that Dr. Sloper might not approve of him or his courtship of Catherine, Townsend suggests that it should not matter to Catherine what her father thinks. Catherine, however, says it matters very much what her father thinks. She wants to conduct the romance with the approval of her father, the representative of genteel society, and refuses to meet with Townsend outside her home. Catherine wishes to remain decorous and respectful of social norms—not conducting her romance in secret, but through open and sanctioned parlor calls.
When Catherine tells Dr. Sloper about her engagement, he recognizes the diversion from the usual and, in his view, proper path, and it seems to him another sign of Townsend’s “vulgar nature” that he has not approached the doctor first to state his intentions. While Dr. Sloper’s well-developed sense of propriety can be seen as old-fashioned and chauvinistic even for his time, Townsend’s consistent willingness to defy social norms adds to suspicions about his intentions toward Catherine.
Mrs. Penniman, in turn, knows the expectations for social propriety but seldom observes them, setting them aside when necessary to promote her romantic fantasies. Mrs. Penniman encourages Townsend to pursue Catherine without Dr. Sloper’s approval and even suggests a secret elopement. She further flouts propriety when she entertains Townsend in her brother’s house while he and Catherine are in Europe. Even her sister, Mrs. Almond, condemns Mrs. Penniman for this. Townsend’s willingness to participate in Mrs. Penniman’s machinations supports Dr. Sloper’s view that Townsend is not a gentleman—or at least does not have the decorum expected of a gentleman of the time.
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