Still Life

Chapter 9 focuses on Evelyn’s past, highlighting her first formative experience in Florence and revealing the source of her life-long connection with this city. Before Evelyn falls in love with Livia, she falls in love with Florence: Italy is her first and most consistent love, and she returns to Florence for decades before she moves there permanently.

The chapter builds on themes of economic inequality; one reason why Evelyn and Livia keep their relationship private is their social and class difference. In the 20th century, social-class statuses were conservatively upheld. It would not have been appropriate for someone from Evelyn’s economic background to be in a relationship with a boardinghouse maid. This attitude dehumanizes Livia, even though Evelyn doesn’t prescribe to this classism. Nevertheless, the relationship poses a greater risk for Livia than it does for Evelyn because Livia could lose her source of employment if they are discovered.

Livia is not the only person that helps jumpstart Evelyn’s adult life. The poet Constance Everly takes Evelyn under her wing, just as Evelyn will one day do with Alys. Thus, Constance, Evelyn, and Alys become sisters in a lineage of brave, autonomous women. The friendships between women in the novel are as important as the romantic relationships between women. Such friendships and the impact they have on those involved are not often revealed in literature from the early and mid-20th century, as the most widely known authors were men. Winman’s contemporary novel rewrites and revises that history, giving women the space and voice they’ve always had to repress.

E. M. Forster is another featured character in Chapter 9, bringing real-life history into the novel’s fictional world. Forster’s novels captured the progressive possibilities of the generations coming out of the Victorian era, and Evelyn’s “room with a view” symbolizes this. By making Evelyn give Forster the title phrase for his novel, Still Life connects the past and present.

The final moments of Chapter 9 reveal the mystery behind where Ulysses goes once a year. With Evelyn, he shares the experience of visiting Darnley’s grave. This highlights the deep connection between him and Evelyn because only they know what it was like to be in Florence during World War II. That Ulysses doesn’t tell anybody about Darnley emphasizes how important Darnley was to him; Evelyn knew the magic of Darnley’s personality, even though their acquaintance was brief. Still Life ends with Ulysses celebrating Darnley’s humor and love of life as opposed to his death. This ends the novel on a note of hope and emphasizes Winman’s message that love is important even when it ends because the memories of your loved ones remain influential for the rest of your life.