Physical surroundings in Jeddah conveyed an impression of death

Evidence

After a few weeks the company moved us to another place, smaller, better for two. It was dark and the lights had to be kept on all day, as if it were the English winter. Each room had many doors, double doors made of dark wood, so it was like a coffin showroom. We took some of them off, but the impression of death persisted. — Hilary Mantel, A Memoir of My Former Self- A Life in…, 250

Categorization

• XREF: Shows Mantel building setting through a controlling metaphor - coffin showroom - which echoes her technique of animating inert spaces in her historical novels.
• SEED: A useful model for depicting a place that repels rather than welcomes, through one governing image sustained and varied.
• corroborated: 2 independent passages support this claim — Hilary Mantel, A Memoir of My Former Self- A Life in…, 250