Virginia Woolf - Mrs Dalloway

Virginia Woolf’s Mrs Dalloway was a bestseller published in 1925, despite the fact

that it was written in an innovative style. Together with her subsequent book, To the

Lighthouse, Mrs Dalloway represents Woolf’s main literary achievement and both

novels received immense critical attention. It is a modern or psychological novel

because she wants to express the inner world of characters, their emotions, feelings,

thoughts, their reactions and her struggle and frustration, that of women, embodied in

the figure of Clarissa, with the world in the aftermath of WW1, breaking the past

conventions that forced authors to depict the outer world and actions of their

characters.

In the summer of 1922 Virginia Woolf’s mind was illuminated by two forces: hearing

Eliot read aloud The Waste Land and reluctantly reading Joyce’s Ulysses, a text that

is often considered one of the greatest novels of the twentieth century. Echoes of both

are heard throughout Mrs Dalloway, submerged, transformed, forged by Woolf into a

new combination. For this reason, just like Ulysses Virginia Woolf’s Mrs Dalloway

is a novel set on a single day in London city in the middle of June of 1923.

It examines one day in the life of Clarissa Dalloway, an upper-class Londoner

married to a member of Parliament.

• Mrs. Dalloway is essentially plotless; what action there is takes place mainly in

the characters’ consciousness. The novel addresses the nature of time in

personal experience through multiple interwoven stories, particularly that of

Clarissa as she prepares for and hosts a party and that of the mentally damaged

war veteran Septimus Warren Smith, who suffers shell-shock or post

traumatic self-disorder and is lost within his own mind.

Despite the fact that the story lacks significant events, on the contrary, the author

enriches it with a dense network of important themes:

• FEMINISM: Through the figure of Clarissa, the heroine of the novel, Woolf

represents her own frustration through the years because of the woman status

during the transition from Victorian period to Modernism. She struggles

constantly to balance her internal life with the external world. Her world

consists of glittering surfaces, such as fine fashion, parties, and high society,

but as she moves through that world she probes beneath (esplora) those

surfaces in search of deeper meaning. Yearning for privacy, Clarissa has a

tendency toward introspection that gives her a profound capacity for emotion,

which many other characters lack. However, she is always concerned with

appearances and keeps herself tightly composed, seldom (raramente) sharing

her feelings with anyone. She uses a constant stream of convivial chatter and

Anteprima parziale del testo

Scarica Mrs Dalloway - Woolf e più Appunti in PDF di Letteratura Inglese solo su Docsity!

Virginia Woolf - Mrs Dalloway

Virginia Woolf’s Mrs Dalloway was a bestseller published in 1925 , despite the fact that it was written in an innovative style. Together with her subsequent book, To the Lighthouse, Mrs Dalloway represents Woolf’s main literary achievement and both novels received immense critical attention. It is a modern or psychological novel because she wants to express the inner world of characters, their emotions, feelings, thoughts, their reactions and her struggle and frustration, that of women, embodied in the figure of Clarissa, with the world in the aftermath of WW1, breaking the past conventions that forced authors to depict the outer world and actions of their characters. In the summer of 1922 Virginia Woolf’s mind was illuminated by two forces: hearing Eliot read aloud The Waste Land and reluctantly reading Joyce’s Ulysses, a text that is often considered one of the greatest novels of the twentieth century. Echoes of both are heard throughout Mrs Dalloway, submerged, transformed, forged by Woolf into a new combination. For this reason, just like Ulysses Virginia Woolf’s Mrs Dalloway is a novel set on a single day in London city in the middle of June of 1923. It examines one day in the life of Clarissa Dalloway , an upper-class Londoner married to a member of Parliament.

Mrs. Dalloway is essentially plotless; what action there is takes place mainly in the characters’ consciousness. The novel addresses the nature of time in personal experience through multiple interwoven stories, particularly that of Clarissa as she prepares for and hosts a party and that of the mentally damaged war veteran Septimus Warren Smith , who suffers shell-shock or post traumatic self-disorder and is lost within his own mind. Despite the fact that the story lacks significant events, on the contrary, the author enriches it with a dense network of important themes:
FEMINISM : Through the figure of Clarissa , the heroine of the novel, Woolf represents her own frustration through the years because of the woman status during the transition from Victorian period to Modernism. She struggles constantly to balance her internal life with the external world. Her world consists of glittering surfaces, such as fine fashion, parties, and high society, but as she moves through that world she probes beneath (esplora) those surfaces in search of deeper meaning. Yearning for privacy, Clarissa has a tendency toward introspection that gives her a profound capacity for emotion, which many other characters lack. However, she is always concerned with appearances and keeps herself tightly composed, seldom (raramente) sharing her feelings with anyone. She uses a constant stream of convivial chatter and

activity to keep her soul locked safely away, which can make her seem shallow (superficiale) even to those who know her well. As a commentary on inter-war society, Clarissa's character highlights the role of women as the proverbial "Angel in the House" and embodies sexual and economic repression and the narcissism of bourgeois women who have never known the hunger and insecurity of working women. She keeps up with and even embraces the social expectations of the wife of a patrician politician, but she is still able to express herself and find distinction in the parties she throws. Clarissa live her life like a prison , with the marriage she has lost her identity, her surname, she is and always will be Mrs Dalloway. Like the same author who, having lost her surname of Stephen with marriage, takes Woolf's. And right in the middle of this great prison, in the middle of the ruthless party that is forced - but at the same time happy - to do, Dr. Bradshaw's wife announces to Clarissa the death of a man. A man, a stranger, perhaps a fool, died by throwing himself out of the window. And Clarissa experiences a kind of empathy , no kind of pain, no compassion, but only self-recognition. This is the right climax of the novel, the point of connection between the nature of Clarissa and the folly of Septimus Warren Smith. The point that unites them in an orgasm of happiness. And it is also the point of intense joy for Clarissa the knowledge of the death of the mysterious stranger. Septimus dies to escape the past, the death of Evans - his fallen friend in war - and human nature, in the guise of the two doctors. He died just when he had re-established that minimum of contact that linked him to Lucrezia. And he brings with him his pain, and the eternal suffering of death. The two characters of Clarissa and Septimus can be seen as foils for each other. As Woolf looked back on her work in Mrs Dalloway for her introduction to the Modern Library edition, she acknowledged the fact that Septimus had indeed been intended as Clarissa’s double. They are in common: their emotional, her dependence from Richard for stability, his dependence upon Lucrezia for protection. Their marriages are founded on need and no on love; Clarissa’s fragility and Septimus’ impotence. But the difference between Clarissa and Septimus is that inability of Septimus brought him to commit suicide, he isn’t able to distinguish between external reality and his personal mind, thoughts; instead Clarissa accepts the idea of death and to go on.

BISEXUALITY: Clarissa Dalloway is strongly attracted to Sally Seton at Bourton. Thirty-four years later, Clarissa still considers the kiss they shared to be the happiest moment of her life. She feels about Sally "as men feel," but she does not recognise these feelings as signs of bisexuality. This feeling is shared also by Virginia Woolf, whom during her life with Leonard, she experienced a strong attachment with the novelist Vita Sackville-West, who gave Virginia the

time measured by hours. It is represented by the Big Ben which shows us and the characters the passage of objective time. It interrupts the narration, and helps the reader to keep track of time, and returns the characters into their present. Subjective time , on the other hand, erases (cancella) the boundary between, present and past, it is flexible, and measured by the intensity of the emotions. Subjective time passes as quickly as the characters feel it, it allows them to think about the past, the present, and also about a hypothetical present based on a different past. It means that they try to envision (immaginare) a different present, which would be the result of a different past, i.e. the “ what if ” questions. Their thoughts move on the free association principle, which enables jumping from the past to the future without chronological order. It means that the thinking processes are discontinuous since the thought or sight of a random thing reminds the characters of the past or future (epiphany/flashback). A good example of this is when Clarissa experience the sunny June morning, and starts to remember her youth. The tolling (rintocco) of Big Ben seems to remind characters of their mortality, of the fact that time is passing and that their end is approaching, that is the main fear of Clarissa. Often, the tolling inspires the characters to think about how they have spent their lives. Time affects everything in this novel, as much of it consists of recollections of the past. The dichotomy between linear time and circular time, that is, between the appearance of a finite end and the existence of eternity, persists throughout the novel. There is a difference between how time operates and how we perceive it. Often, there are narrative pauses between the interior monologues of different characters to reflect on the nature of time. Virginia Woolf was so interested in exploring how time affects our reality that she almost named her novel “ The Hours .”

Mrs Dalloway - Woolf, Appunti di Letteratura Inglese

Documenti correlati

Anteprima parziale del testo

Scarica Mrs Dalloway - Woolf e più Appunti in PDF di Letteratura Inglese solo su Docsity!

Virginia Woolf - Mrs Dalloway