Hotel Gloriana

In the very beginning of the novel Seize the Day, the author has told us about Hotel Gloriana. He has chosen this place as a setting to serve his purpose. The lifestyle of the people living in this hotel is somehow connected with it. The author has wanted to portray isolation, degenerated human relationship etc. in this novel. Hotel Gloriana is an appropriate setting to serve his purpose. The people living here are isolated and they suffer from degenerated relationship. 

Their relationship is based on money. Tommy Wilhelm, the protagonist of the novel, lives in this hotel temporarily. He is isolated from his family because he is a failure in life. His father Dr. Adler also lives in this hotel but he does not want to have any connection with Wilhelm. Most of the guests at Hotel Gloriana are past the age of retirement. Dr. Adler is one of them. This handsome old doctor stands well above the other old people in the hotel. He is idolized by everyone. He is known as the best diagnostician in New York. The clerks, the elevator operators, the girls and waitresses, and chambermaids flatter and pamper him. 

This is what Dr. Adler wants. Among the old people in the hotel, Wilhelm feels uneasy because he is quite young. He rises early and is in the lobby by eight o’clock. He buys the paper and some cigars and drinks Coca cola. He meets the man at the newsstand whose name is Rubin and talks with him. In the same hotel Wilhelm meets Dr. Tamkin with whom he signs a deal. The business proves futile. Wilhelm suffers from utter financial crisis. He seeks help from his father but his father flatly refuses to help him. His father thinks that once he starts helping, he will have to continue. He does not want to have a burden on him in his old age. So, we see that many incidents take place in Hotel Gloriana. It is a perfect setting because it helps the author to depict the desired themes.