A Room of Susan's Own

There is no denying that troubled marriages have been depicted as “picture-perfect” in past literature works solely to fit society’s perception of an ideal lifestyle. From Pulitzer Winner Michael Cunningham’s rendering of Laura Brown’s insufferable life, playing house with a man she never fell for, in The Hours to Richard Yates’s description of April Wheeler’s story as she goes from marrying the man she thought to be the love of her life to hating herself for ever doing so because of the empty promises her husband made in all the years they have been together in Revolutionary Road, it is safe to say that there have been many books written on women trapped in a seemingly flawless marriage. Conceivably one of the most outstanding examples of this case is Susan in “To Room Nineteen”. In Lessing’s short story, it is emphasized that Susan leads a perfectly planned life but rather sooner she concludes that orthodox desires are not a synonym for happiness. When the story is viewed from that perspective it can be said that Doris Lessing’s “To Room Nineteen” tackles the idea of how a perfectly planned life is sometimes not enough for women who live in a patriarchal society which Lessing explores through Susan’s journey of life starting from her everlasting search for a sense of freedom to her alienation from society wholly. 

The short story’s second page opens with the line “Both had well-paid jobs.”, portraying a couple that can be considered financially stable. By society’s standards, a pair of working individuals who later take their relationship to the next level by bringing up a child once they can care for another monetarily is seen as a part of an average woman’s passage to motherhood. While we can interpret that Susan and Matthew’s intelligent partnership is quite different than that of their peers, Lessing chooses to describe it as: 

“It was one of those cases of a man and a woman linking themselves whom no one else had ever thought of linking, probably because of their similarities.” 

The rest of the story proves the theory that their marriage is indeed a failed one. 

Much like Barbara Hill Rigney states in her book titled Madness and Sexual Politics in the Feminist Novel: Studies in Brontë, Woolf, Lessing, and Atwood:

Susan no longer feels completely satisfied with the life she is leading. Even though finding time for herself is rather a difficult thing to do when she has five people to cater to, she starts seeking solitude regardless and finds it in the short but blissful time that her twins are dropped off at school. 

Shortly after the events of the previous events, once she has had a few hours to spare for herself on weekdays, she finally remembers the actual value of one’s own identity. During “An Analysis of Three Images in Doris Lessing’s To Room Nineteen.” Kun Zhao explains Susan’s state of mind in his analysis of the images used in Lessing’s “To Room Nineteen”:

“She began thinking about herself she lost long before in her marriage life. She discovered that it was housework, children and husband that made her lose her self-identity.”

Before she married, Susan was a woman who was able to make ends meet. She was someone who never had to answer to anyone but herself but after domestication Susan lost that part of herself, and it left its place to a perpetual feeling of wanting to break free from the responsibilities patriarchy has thrust on her, which Lessing conveys to her readers with the lines “I need to be more alone than I am.” she then follows this statement with “...do you realize that I never feel free?” emphasizing how deeply she believes it to be true.  

As was stated before, Susan seeks to find a place where she can spend some time by herself and find out who she is when she is her own person outside of her family for her identity is too rooted in what her married life has forced onto her as she is no longer an entity of her own. Zhao defines this stage of being as:

Her initial escape plan is to turn the spare room into what Lessing referred to as “Mother’s Room” but soon after she puts a “do not disturb” sign on the door; her personal space, which was supposed to be hers and hers only, is invaded by the little humans that know no boundaries whatsoever. It seems as if there is no way of getting away from the children she birthed, that is why Mother’s room instead ends up being the family’s common room. Her next solution is to find a hotel, which in theory would have worked out fine had she not become irritated with the poor manageress Miss Townsend. Her last resort is to book a room in Fred’s hotel. There she is finally what she hoped she could be. Lessing depicts this long-awaited moment of Susan’s with a simple sentence that reads “She was free.”. 

Susan’s seclusion from the woman she once was is perhaps best understood from Rula Quawas’s words in her article titled “Lessing’s To Room Nineteen: Susan’s Voyage into the Inner Space of ‘Elsewhere’” in Atlantis where she describes what the room means to Susan by writing: 

“Susan’s reclusive stay in room nineteen serves a healing, redemptive function enabling her to break down her emotional sterility and isolation and find more satisfying ways of being-becoming.”

The room grants her carte blanche therefore it signifies absolute freedom for Susan. Free from the life she cannot bear to go back to, free from the lives that are ever so dependent on her, free from everything that is until the spell is broken. The patriarchal system of the time can be held responsible for Susan’s current state in which she feels trapped, and when she finally discovers a way to break free a man ruins it all for her yet again. When her husband becomes suspicious of what she has been up to, he hires a detective to figure out where she is spending the money he gives her. This desperate act of her husband leaves Susan feeling quite uneasy as she is quite fond of her little secret and now that she is found out, it is all over. The room no longer is a symbol of solitude for it has been corrupted by the one person she was hoping to get away from, her husband, and by association the man who did his dirty work for him. Her peaceful time in the room was long gone and she was forced to get out of her shell. Due to the latest events calling for a conversation neither had anticipated to have, Susan tells Matthew that she is indeed having an affair although she forgets to mention it is with an imaginary person. Nevertheless, with the cat out of the bag the room that was her safe place no longer, room nineteen is now no different to her than any other room.  

With all that said, it is perfectly possible to argue that Susan has no right to feel the way she does and that she is just showing early signs of depression. While Susan is very much entitled to feel as though she is being smothered, some counterarguments can yet be made about how Susan is unappreciative of the life she should be ever grateful for. With a husband by her side to support and carry her through anything and four little bundles of joy to keep her company, what more could she wish for? When one looks at Susan’s life from the patriarchal society’s point of view, it is everything a woman should wish for and more, but it should not be forgotten that women are allowed to feel dissatisfied, overwhelmed, worthless, and empty. Women are allowed to feel. Although Susan is one of the fortunate women to have a place to call home and a family to turn to when in need, it still does not equal to a happy environment. Is being secure under a roof worth staying married to a man who will never understand your everyday troubles? Is it worth trading your freedom if you will have to fake smiles every day for the rest of your life and sacrifice every dream you ever dreamt? How much is your soul worth? A house? Two kids? How much is too much? Where can people like Susan draw the line before they cross the fine line between madness and happiness? The answer to these questions is that women’s right to choose their own life path is worth more than

While this subtly touches on all the questions that are stated above, we are not the ones to decide what is madness and what is just plain humane for we are not Doris Lessing’s Susan Rawling or Henrik Ibsen’s Nora Helmer. The patriarchal world demands women to make sacrifices to simply please their partner. Women have been told to make do with imperfect lifestyles that have been glorified since the beginning of time. While Susan also happens to be one of those women, Lessing uses her crafty storytelling to tell the tale of Susan’s failed attempt to become Mrs. Rawling as she goes from being content with settling for Matthew to completely shutting herself out from the outside world.