Self-Awareness of Character in "The Type-Writer Girl"

One of the most noticeable characteristics of Juliet’s conscience (and narration) is her rationalization of her reality to literature. In this she often superimposes her own “Homeric” adventures onto those of characters that she deems worthy of emulation or at least notice. Nowhere is this more evident that in her naming of most of her characters from past literature. This is especially important because her own name is that of one of Shakespeare’s heroines. Because of this fact she is, perhaps unwittingly, forced into this methodology of life and, in particular, to her self-proclaimed search for a Romeo: “My name is Juliet; you may well believe I have had moments when I thrilled with the expectation of a Romeo” (74). This proves to be an essential aspect of her character, as Allen must have clearly known in providing us with a main character keenly aware of her “character-ness”.
This fact is precisely what complicates her style as that of a “new woman”. Though she exhibits many of the attributes that are meant to characterize her as such (bicycle riding, her dress, smoking, etc.), she harbors these sentiments of a Shakespearean Juliet in her search for a man and in her own awareness that “woman is plastic till the predestined man appears” (85). From her narration we see that with the arrival of her “Romeo”, she becomes far more aware of the character-like quality that each of them are meant to play. She adopts somewhat of a persona even upon their first meaning, trying her best to maintain and fulfill her role as the “employee” when she sees that he is willing to give her undue treatment with regard to the carrying of her typewriter. Such intentional self-characterization may equally be said to stem from her awareness of her self as a literary Juliet or have provided her with later insight into her behavior as such. Either way, the notion of her modernity is brought into question with this adoption of the quintessentially female persona.