MRS. DALLOWAY by Virginia Woolf (1925)
Virginia Woolf was born on the 25th of January, 1882 into an upper-middle-class family in London.
They had a busy social life involving artists, writers, politicians and aristocrats.
Virginia was educated at home and she became an enthusiastic reader, spending hours in her father’s
library. She soon decided that she wanted to be a writer.
Death and its effect
By the age of 24, she had suffered 4 deaths in the family which were to have a significant effect on her
health for her life. Virginia was obsessed with the memory of her dead parents; she wrote a portrait of
them in her novel: To the Lighthouse. She suffered a mental breakdown after her mother and father’s
death, when she attempted to commit suicide.
Who founded the Bloomsbury group
The Bloomsbury Group began when Virginia Woolf’s father Sir Leslie Stephen, died in 1904.
Virginia and her three siblings Thoby, Vanessa and Adrian, decided to move from Hyde Park Gate into a
home in Gordon square within the Bloomsbury district.
Thoby Stephen then began inventing inviting his friends from Trinity collage: Leonard Woolf, Lytton
Strachey and Clive Bell, to the Stephen’s home on Thursday nights for parties, during which they met
Virginia and Vanessa and openly discussed taboo and controversial topics.
The Bloomsbury Group was a circle of writers, artists and intellectuals from the Bloomsbury district of
London. The “Bloomsberries”, as they were called, were mostly privileged and well-educated members of
the upper class. Yet, what separates them from other intellectual groups at the time was that they were the
only group to support gay rights, women in the arts, pacifism, open marriage, uninhibited sexuality and
other unconventional ideas.
Having grown up in Victorian household, the Bloomsbury Group openly rejected the old Victorian values,
the group rejected old Victorian ideals from their childhood and adopted more liberal and progressive
attitudes. Seeing Victorian society as prudish and narrow minded they chose to live freely and unrestricted.
As the book “Great World Writers: Twentieth Century” explains: “In short, they were determined to
reinvented society, at least within their own circle”.
Mrs. Dalloway
Plot
Clarissa Dalloway an upper-class housewife, walks through her London neighborhood to prepare for the
party she will host that evening.
When she returns for the flower shopping, an old friend Peter Walsh, came in her house unexpectedly. The
two have always judged each other.
Peter leaves and goes to Regent’s Park. He thinks about Clarissa’s refusal, which still obsesses him. Peter
asks Clarissa if she is happy with her husband, Richard, but before she ca answer, her daughter Elizabeth,
enters the room.
Years earlier Clarissa refused Peter’s marriage proposal, and Peter has never quite gotten over it.
The point of view then shifts to Septimus, a veteran of WWI who suffers from shell shock. Septimus and his
Italian wife are waiting for Sir. William Bradshaw, a psychiatrist.
Clearly Septimus’s experience in the war have permanently scarred him, and he has serious mental
problems. However, Sir William does not listen to what Septimus says. Sir William plans to separate
Septimus from Lucrezia and send him to a mental institution in the country.
Septimus is obsessed with his memories of Evans, a friend who was killed in the war. Lucrezia is taking
Septimus to two doctors but he kills himself later later in the day, to escape his doctors, and because he
feels he has no other alternative.
Explicit/Implicit References to the Historical Context
