Brain Pain discussion
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Mrs. Dalloway
Mrs. Dalloway - Spine 2014
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Discussion - Week One & Two - Mrs. Dalloway
I read that Septimus was not originally part of Woolf's plan for the book which amazes me. I cannot imagine the book without Septimus who is such a balance to Mrs. Dalloway's musings. Septimus' thoughts are so fractured, his response to London so visceral and nightmarish. He also seems to bring in Woolf's own struggle with mental illness and the general madness of war. Interesting idea about Joyce. I need to think about it. A few immediate thoughts: like Ulysses, Woolf is detailing the experience in a day of a person, using a stream of thoughts. Like Bloom (a Jew) and Stephen (an artist), the viewpoints are those of outsiders (a woman and a man on the edge of suicide). Unlike Ulysses, for me at least, the structure of the book is more fluid and less rigid.
Why are women compared to trees? Maybe because they are rooted in the body, in earth, unlike men who are more abstract (not my thoughts but maybe Woolf's-although I do think that because of biology, especially motherhood, women actually are more grounded in the body than many men). Also, trees are life-giving, especially in June when leaves and blossoms are filling them and women are as well.
I'll have to think about Elizabeth's "oriental" look.
It's such fun to revisit this Woolf. So much easier than The Waves, at least on the surface, but so much beneath that surface.
I've only read the first 30 pages. I was hoping this discussion would give me some touchstones to help me across the rushing river, and I think it has. At least I have a better idea now what Septimus is doing in the middle of all this.
This was my first book of the year and what a place to start. I absolutely loved it. I find it hard to imagine how Woolf packs so many ideas and themes into such a small volume. I've not read Ulysses so can't comment on the comparison, but it seems a great coincidence if there isn't some influence or response going on there.
The stream of consciousness style works beautifully here and of course fits in perfectly with a story that is very much about the juxtaposition of internal lives with external relationships and society. I felt it was an incredibly visual book; I could see it so clearly, including the physical 'jump' of the narration from one person to the next as it occurred.
I agree with Ellie that it is difficult to imagine this book without Septimus. He is so central to the ideas and themes that come through in the story - namely, the pressures of societal conformity and the struggle between inner and outer lives. Not to mention his incredibly relevant role in representing the damage of war and this particularly critical time for a changing English society.
I think that he and Clarissa have much in common - but war is the differentiator that has pushed him over the edge, quite literally. Clarissa has developed strategies for 'managing' her social responsibilities and external pressures; Septimus no longer has the ability to navigate the outside world.
The trees are an interesting metaphor and I'd love to hear other interpretations. Again, I recall it being Clarissa and Septimus who are particularly drawn to them and hold them in a sacred regard. Perhaps because trees are grounded / deeply rooted and live a solitary existence - the ideal, to be admired?
I couldn't put my finger on the oriental references, but it was repeated often enough to suggest some significance...perhaps it's a tool to distinguish the generations of women, but the symbolism is lost on me.
There have been almost too many efforts to tie Ulysses and Mrs. Dalloway. This article: http://modernism.research.yale.edu/wi...(and the second part of it http://modernism.research.yale.edu/wi... )
Make far more study of it than my feeble efforts ever could. My impression is that Ulysses had an effect, but certainly Proust and Dorothy Richardson did as well. I think it would be a mistake to think Ulysses played a central role. Certainly it clearly has some role though.
But if we just wanted to cause mischief, we could ask if Peter is a response to Stephen, or Septimus an answer to Bloom. It's fun to think about, but I personally won't indulge that too much.
Of particular interest to me is how the book began life as two stories, "Mrs Dalloway in Bond Street", and "The Prime Minister".
There's a great deal to write about Mrs. Dalloway, and I'm sure it will take me a great deal of time to write my review.
Mod
I picked up on the Ulysses connection on page 2 "For it was the middle of June." Considering how recently Ulysses had been published, this seemed like more than a coincidence.
I haven't done any secondary reading for this book, but if you find any links, please add them over in the "Questions, Resources..." thread here:
https://www.goodreads.com/topic/show/...
Mod
...
The stream of consciousness style works beautifully here and of course fits in perfectly with a story that is very much about the juxtaposition of internal lives with external relationships and society. I felt it was an incredibly visual book; I could see it so clearly, including the physical 'jump' of the narration from one person to the next as it occurred..."
I'm glad you enjoyed the book. I agree the visuals are very strong, as well as sound and movement. One of my favorite images is of Big Ben ringing out the time and how "The leaden circles dissolved in the air." A marvelous multi-sensory picture forms from that.
Mod
I couldn't detect any one-to-one relations like that. For me it was simply the "day in the life of a Londoner/Dubliner" similarity and the challenging use of complex language/imagery and stream of consciousness prose.
PS. Will, did you like my mash-up poem?
My thoughts were (again, to cause mischief here) that if this were to be a sort of response to Ulysses, then it's fun (if no doubt entirely inaccurate) to think about Peter being Stephen, older, greying, failed. Or Septimus being partly a stand-in for Bloom. Military service, feeling an outsider. These are entirely flights of fancy I warn you, Gentle Readers. I don't believe any of this.I cross posted the links on Ulysses/Woolf on the appropriate thread. I've been mixing myself up while trying to write a very elaborate and detailed year long joke on another thread someplace.
I'm only at page 30 but I've already slipped in and out of the point of views (consciousness) of maybe a dozen characters, though the first thirteen pages or so are pretty much from Clarissa's POV. The transitional devices (how Woolf gets from character to character)are intriguing and no doubt will mean more as the story unfolds. A car's backfire (an explosion)and then the vehicle itself gets us from Clarissa to Septimus/Lucrezia and then back to Clarissa. The car's passage then gets us into the minds of Moll Pratt and Sara Bletchly. But then along comes a skywriting airplane that returns us to Septimus's mind, fervent at this point (explosions and airplanes). The tension and oddness of Septimus/Lucrezia get us into Maisie Johnson's mind, and Maisie's plight puts us in Mrs. Dempster's mind, which drifts back to the airplane. Circling and circling. Occasionally surfacing is an omniscient narrator who sees all these characters turning to dust, history, and whose language is far out of reach for the characters I've so far met ("... and to return the frail hum of the motor wheels as the walls of a whispering gallery return a single voice expanded and made sonorous by the might of a whole cathedral.")
Good work, Alex. I'm also at p. 30, and I identified some of those "thinkers" but not all of them. Sometimes I am in doubt about whether a particular thought is coming from Mrs. Dalloway or someone else. Clearly I will have to work harder at figuring out who is thinking any given thought.
Mod
I wouldn't try too hard to decipher every thought on your first pass through the book. Abandon yourself to the flow during the rapids, then regroup in the eddies (see above). People who love this book return to again and again to shoot the rapids and enjoy the thrill of Woolf's language unleashed...
Right, Casceil. There were several places where I couldn't figure out if it was Mrs. Dalloway's thoughts about another character or we had momentarily shifted into that character's thoughts.
reading with a light hand upon the tiller, as Jim suggests, is definitely the best way to read it. Trying to separate between third person omniscient narration and the so-called "stream‐of‐consciousness voice" (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stream_...) probably distracts and detracts from the intended effect. Personally, when I first started reading books using these techniques, when I stopped worrying about it I found myself bobbing peacefully above the waves in time with the rhythm of the sea instead of drowning with confusion. Of course, all should be reminded (IMHO) that fancy terms like the above, or the lovely sounding and horribly elitist "monologue intérieur" don't need to be given much attention to enjoy reading the book. They help us talk about it perhaps, but have little to do with reading them (again, just my little opinion)
Alex wrote: "...There were several places where I couldn't figure out if it was Mrs. Dalloway's thoughts about another character or we had momentarily shifted into that character's thoughts."A very helpful comment, Alex. Thx. I think you just enabled me to positively identify the "him" in this early passage, which I had stumbled over:
"She stiffened a little on the kerb, waiting for Durtnall's van to pass. A charming woman, Scrope Purvis thought her (knowing her as one does know people who live next door to one in Westminster); a touch of the bird about her, of the jay, blue-green, light, vivacious, though she was over fifty, and grown very white since her illness. There she perched, never seeing him, waiting to cross, very upright...."
Woolf, Virginia (2012-06-06). Mrs. Dalloway (Illustrated Edition) (p. 2). Dead Dodo Vintage. Kindle Edition.
Probably last read this in 1999, with a f2f group, along with Michael Cunningham's The Hours, which was based on V.W.'s style and M.D. May have revisited part of it briefly sometime since.
(Jim -- I hope passages from the text are okay here. Let me/us know, please. P.S., liked your mash-up poem.)
Jim wrote: "Casceil wrote: " Clearly I will have to work harder at figuring out who is thinking any given thought..."I wouldn't try too hard to decipher every thought on your first pass through the book. Aba..."
This is good advice!! I definitely enjoyed humming along without too much concern for who was narrating each line. Somehow it all works out and the effect is lyrical.
Jen wrote: "...I definitely enjoyed humming along without too much concern for who was narrating each line. Somehow it all works out and the effect is lyrical...."Coming back to it, I know that must have been the way I read M.D. the first time! And I did like it then -- more than our companion piece. Jen, I like your choice of words: "lyrical."
The passage Lily quotes in message 16 is one that gave me trouble, also, and it helps to understand that we did momentarily switch into Purvis's thoughts.
Casceil wrote: "The passage Lily quotes in message 16 is one that gave me trouble, also, and it helps to understand that we did momentarily switch into Purvis's thoughts."Casceil -- and to now guess that it isn't his own name on the truck he's driving!? :-) (I do still want to know about "Bourton" on the opening page, but I'll be patient.)
I don't think Purvis was driving. I think he was standing nearby.
Casceil wrote: "I don't think Purvis was driving. I think he was standing nearby."Hmmm! Okay, that's possible, too. I've not (yet?) spotted the evidence to discern between our readings, Casceil -- other than it was not his name on the truck and Purvis does live nearby. But this is getting bogged in the minutiae of craft and ignoring the flow -- sorry.
Mod
Hmmm! Okay, that's possible, too. I've not (yet?) spotted the evidence to discern between our readings, Cascei..."
This kind of ambiguity exists throughout the text. The fact that we don't know for certain if Scope Purvis was driving or standing nearby is reflected often with characters trying to recall names and events and not being certain exactly who is who, many times switching to a pronoun when the name would not come - in essence, letting go of details and letting life flow. To give meaning to every observed detail would lead to madness and inertia - much like what Septimus experiences sitting on a bench in the park. To make it through life - and this book - we are forced to let go and let things flow...
All that being said, the two important bits of info in that passage are her comparison to a bird, which, along with trees, women are often compared to, and, her appearance after recovering from her illness.
Generally, I don't like to make assumptions about how the author's personal life affects their work, but with Woolf, this is unavoidable given her well documented struggles with mental health problems. I couldn't help but see Septimus as a representation of that aspect of her life - her struggles with depression, her feelings about doctors and asylums, and even the fleeting moment where Septimus believes the birds are speaking to him in Greek, which is apparently something that Woolf herself experienced. Woolf was a deep thinker and intellectual and it is only logical that she would have examined her own condition and its effects. I'll stop this thought here, but do take a look at some of the biographical info about her life when time permits.
Mod
First, screw Evelyn Waugh and the horse he rode in on... (I feel better now, thank you)
With the contemporary interest in psychology stirred up by the work of William James and Sigmund Freud, the work of Proust, Joyce, Faulkner, and Woolf placed memory, consciousness, and the workings of the mind at the forefront of their formal experimentation. The "bad writing" was their attempt to represent these processes of the mind. The "Benjy" section of The Sound and the Fury is a great example of this experimentation with form and is certainly a major preoccupation of modernist writers and later, the surrealists of Paris, especially those associated with Breton.
Also, Dorothy Richardson is credited with developing the "stream of consciousness" style, but Woolf really grabbed the ball and ran with it...
I am only about 33 pages into the book, but have found it to be a little better than the half dozen times I have tried to read it before. :) I am struck by how Septimus is unable to find help from the Doctor. His wife is always mentioning how the Dr. told her nothing was wrong with him and to get him interested in everyday life. I know with my mother's depression that it makes you unable to even see everyday life in the same way.
Mod
It seems to be a 20th century trend that countries don't want to acknowledge the stress-related problems suffered by veterans. Validating Septimus's troubles would be an admission that war and killing cause wounds beyond the physical. Sad, really, but so is war.
It’s been suggested that stream of consciousness is simply a variation on the internal monologues that Shakespeare, among other playwrights, allowed their characters to voice, Hamlet let’s say. What seems different to me in the 20th Century novels under discussion is the content of the stream and how the streams converge and reemerge (oh so lightly on the tiller). This is where modern cities and modern wars come into play. In Mrs. Dalloway, everyone is in one place, shoulder to shoulder. There is a merging of class, occupation, age, intellect, experience that’s reflected in the content of the characters’ minds and the almost seamless transition from SOC to SOC. Screw war, too.
Alex wrote: "...and the almost seamless transition from SOC to SOC...."Yes, appreciate the observations, Alex, and yet one of the things I noticed today is how VW sometimes seems to use change in SOC's as more traditional authorial transitions, with perhaps an humorous agent between, as when the little girl Elise facilitates the change in focus from Peter Walsh to Septimus's wife Lucrezia by running into her legs. (p. 65 in HBC pb)
I had a few questions I may not be able to resolve about this charming vignette -- the text says "the elderly nurse knitted over the sleeping baby," yet little Elise is picking up pebbles for the nursery mantel collection created with her brother. How many children are with the nurse in Regent Park: three, two, or only one? Of course, the answer probably doesn't matter to the story, but it may say something about this type of storytelling and its rules, or manipulation thereof, about relationships to reality.
Perhaps more interesting is what VW does with the interlude where Peter is snoring. That comes across to me as almost a bit of Greek chorus, touching the concerns of the populace among whom the actors are living their lives. But that may be a melodramatic and off-base interpretation.
Finally, in this passage, I was struck by the juxtaposition of Peter's and I'll say Septimus's stories, but maybe Peter's and Rezia's.
It isn't so much a transition from one SOC to another, but another tidbit of humor I enjoyed today was when Clarissa interrupted Lucy's reverie as the maid was setting up for the party and proceeded to re-adjust the position of the crystal dolphin that Lucy had shifted towards the clock. The story goes on to display Mrs. Dalloway's generosity of spirit towards their servants, even as she herself takes on the task of repairing her dress for the evening's party. (Time plays through this entire passage in several ways, from the clock to the servants' free time to the multi-tasking between upstairs and downstairs.) (pp 38-39 in HBC pb)
On this cold, cold day in NJ (the coldest I recall experiencing here in 40+ years -- staying in the single digits), I must have been in the mood for humor -- appearing in unexpected little twists, such as Richard attempting to slip in undetected (socks, gentle twist of the handle) and then swearing as he dropped his hot water bottle. (p. 32) Even Clarissa's obsessing over Lady Bruton's lunch could be considered with an indulgent smile as perhaps a bit over-the-top.
Good points, Lily. As with Lady Bruton's lunch, I take Clarissa's envy of Lady Bexborough's "skin of crumpled leather" to be a kind of whimsy, playing with her own thoughts, pretending. There are lots of funny bits slipped into her observations. I like this woman. By the way, I'm not in but from NJ, so I understand your need for humor in the month of the Polar Vortex.
I'm only on page 62 and I must admit, I'm struggling a bit with this novel. I read To the Lighthouse last year and loved it, so I know the problem is not the stream-of-consciousness style. I found with TTL, Woolf concentrated most of the reader's attention on Mrs. Ramsey and while the other characters did develop personalities of their own, there was one central figure and the "streams" seemed to flow towards her. In Mrs. Dalloway the thoughts are going out from her (so far), almost a reverse, and I'm having a harder time following along. Of course, there's much more to go so I will keep plugging away.I'm appreciating everyone's thoughts and observations!
Cleo, I like your observation about streams flowing in toward Mrs. Ramsey and out from Clarissa. I'll have to think about that.
I finished this book earlier this afternoon – my favorite aspect of it are the outdoor scenes, where this is this sense of direction with the narrative voices. It’s like the third person omniscient voice is moving through the crowds, jumping in and out of the minds of those passing by, but also being distracted by the same things as the crowds (such as the car in the opening pages). So you end up with this jumble of voices, but it’s all propelled in certain directions, and really feels like your walking down a London street.
And, just caught up on reading this thread:
Jen wrote: "The trees are an interesting metaphor and I'd love to hear other interpretations. Again, I recall it being Clarissa and Septimus who are particularly drawn to them and hold them in a sacred regard. Perhaps because trees are grounded / deeply rooted and live a solitary existence - the ideal, to be admired?"
I came away with the focus on the trees being pretty central to Clarissa and Septimus as well – though there is at least one passage where Elizabeth is compared to a tree – and there seems to be some notion of the soul being tied into the tree images – “her soul rustled” “down in the depths of that leaf-encumbered forest, the soul” – or sometimes just the notion of self – “And the leaves being connected by millions of fibres with his own body”. Not that I know what any of it means, but it’s interesting how frequently trees show up in the narrative.
Suzanne wrote: "The observation about tree/women references is cool. I always notice how flowers appear (and seem to play a symbolic role) throughout."
One of the things I liked with the flower imagery is that there is this sheer volume of flowers referenced throughout the book, but, when they are mentioned in relation to Richard and Hugh – both characters representing a very certain class, a class in the book that is becoming antiquated and (possibly) obsolete – there are only roses and carnations, two very safe, very traditional choices of flowers.
And, just caught up on reading this thread:
Jen wrote: "The trees are an interesting metaphor and I'd love to hear other interpretations. Again, I recall it being Clarissa and Septimus who are particularly drawn to them and hold them in a sacred regard. Perhaps because trees are grounded / deeply rooted and live a solitary existence - the ideal, to be admired?"
I came away with the focus on the trees being pretty central to Clarissa and Septimus as well – though there is at least one passage where Elizabeth is compared to a tree – and there seems to be some notion of the soul being tied into the tree images – “her soul rustled” “down in the depths of that leaf-encumbered forest, the soul” – or sometimes just the notion of self – “And the leaves being connected by millions of fibres with his own body”. Not that I know what any of it means, but it’s interesting how frequently trees show up in the narrative.
Suzanne wrote: "The observation about tree/women references is cool. I always notice how flowers appear (and seem to play a symbolic role) throughout."
One of the things I liked with the flower imagery is that there is this sheer volume of flowers referenced throughout the book, but, when they are mentioned in relation to Richard and Hugh – both characters representing a very certain class, a class in the book that is becoming antiquated and (possibly) obsolete – there are only roses and carnations, two very safe, very traditional choices of flowers.
Mod
Revolutionary and avante garde among artists. I haven't read any critics from that era, but I imagine some would have found the work offensively incoherent... Some looked at Ulysses as pornographic, FWIW.
Much of the art and literature of the 1920's was a reaction to the horror of the Great War and its aftermath, and so the confusion and discord and chaos of the times are mirrored in the work.
Yes and no, Jaye. Remember this was an age of tremendous innovation in the arts: modern painting (cubism, expressionistic, etc.) music: Stravinsky (in 1913 his Rite of Spring caused a riot in the Paris Opera House, but he had his fans.) Novelists were experimenting, but they had their reasons. As Jim has mentioned, this was the age of Freud, not to mention Einstein and quantum theory, World War I and mustard gas, technology and metropolises--moving pictures! How to get all that in a novel? The techniques were revolutionary "and" in vogue, but not with everyone (will "in vogue" allow that?). Many people still throw up their hands at modern art. I'm no fan of atonal music. I do think it's important to address technique (stream of consciousness, etc.) with this novel.
Jaye wrote: "As in, when MD was published would the 'experts' have discussed the lilting from one character's stream of consciousness to another? Would that choice of narrative have been viewed as revolutionary or in vogue? ..."I wonder if this style would be so unfamiliar to the experts. To me it's similar to poetry; the reader is exposed to a number of images and he/she has to consolidate the images to determine how they fit the story.
In the resources thread, the articles I linked from the Modernist Lab at Yale discuss what she was reading in the few years before, the other SoC works that had come out already, and certainly illuminate much of this.
Can anyone shed any light on the signficance of the flowers, plants and trees mentioned in this novel? I looked up the meaning of hydrangeas, for instance, and discovered that they stand for "frigidity" and "heartlessness." Did Woolf accordingly intend her readers to associate Clarissa with hydrangeas? Also, what does everyone think about the references to ancient history and the Roman invasion? These seemed to stand out in sharp relief when juxtaposed to the jolting sounds and impressions of the rare motor car and Septimus's war recollections.
I have read that the images associated with Septimus's mental un-ease were chiefly borrowed from Woolf's own struggles with mental illness. That being said, are there key passages, descriotions that we can say are Woolf's, e.g. the talking sparrow?
Tia wrote: "I have read that the images associated with Septimus's mental un-ease were chiefly borrowed from Woolf's own struggles with mental illness. That being said, are there key passages, descriptions tha..."Tia -- Jim @24 mentions VW reported hearing the birds speak Greek, as happens for Septimus here. I felt a foreshadowing of VW's note that she left to her husband, absolving him of any blame and assuring him that he had provided for her to have what happiness she had experienced. But, it seems to me that we must remember that this was written ~16 years before VW's demise and in those ensuing years she produced several other master works, including To the Lighthouse, Orlando, A Room of One's Own, and Waves.
I suspect much of Septimus's symptoms are drawn from the author's experiences. For one thing half of them are NOT indicative of PTS (I, like many others, hope to someday drive the "D" out of the term... It's what happens, not a disorder)For example hearing the birds speak Greek is possible, while unlikely, but visually perceiving Evans somewhat less so. Woolf however, did experience visual hallucinations prior to writing MD, if memory serves, of her dead mother.
This is extremely understandable though, considering not only the author writing from her own experiences, but in that the subject matter was so little understood, partly why she was exploring it. Honestly we've only begun to even try to in the past 10 years... Read about the effects of the therapies used on Vietnam vets for a horror story, or imagine the societal neglect of mental health we gave to WW2 vets. No matter how off-target or accurate her portrayal, to my mind she did a great service for helping even make it part of the thinking of the time.
Also, in case there's even one of you still reading this, if you're interested in the topic, there's an excellent book, I believe "surviving survival".. When I next sit at a device not my phone, I'll post the link.
Edit: Surviving Survival: The Art and Science of Resilience, by Laurence Gonzales, which I recommend highly, btw.
/end preaching.
She will get the flowers herself, she will sew the torn dress herself…these quotidian activities are perhaps a way for Clarissa to ground herself– pitted against the fragmentary nature of her own mind and thoughts. She may suffer from a ‘nervous’ disposition.Goethe called flowers the soul expression of the plant, and though Virginia Woolf may not necessarily have read Goethe, it feels to me that she’s interested in the soul or psychological states of her characters. References to trees may evoke grounding/anchorage for the reader, the writer, the self in general (the reference seems to have caught the attention of a few readers in any case). We’re in the minds of the characters and we gain an intimacy with their thought fragments – thought flitting from one to another, or the way the thought flows out from one character’s mind to another, that it’s chaotic and at times it can become intolerable – particularly in the mind of Septimus, who has lost the capacity to feel and is not him self. He’s lost that centre that he can call a self (however illusory the idea of a ‘self’ may be). The soul or mind is not a unified whole but there must be something to keep the self from falling apart. What binds the parts together? Woolf is said to have been interested in what keeps the self together because of her own challenges with mental illness. How are Mrs Dalloway and Septimus different – Dalloway is planning a party while Septimus plans to kill himself? Clarissa has found ways to keep her self from falling apart.
I'm not sure I read her sewing the dress quite the same way, but instead a sort of shyness, or unwillingness to impose, even upon servants. Clearly Clarissa exhibits signs of depression, whether as design of the character or bled over from it's author, but (page numbers from my edition, obviously, mileage varies..) by pg. 3, something awful..happen, pg. 8, dangerous to live even one day. There's even a chilling reference to death via wading early on.
There's some Clarissa/Septimus things I find fascinating, but they come later. Since many people sound like they're within the first 30-50 pages or so, I'll abstain for now, limiting myself to things from the first 15 or so.
Will wrote: "I'm not sure I read her sewing the dress quite the same way, but instead a sort of shyness, or unwillingness to impose, even upon servants. Clearly Clarissa exhibits signs of depression, whether ..."
I would not have chosen shy to describe Clarissa. The novel opens with an assertion of her will, and I wouldn’t dismiss the ordinariness of it (i.e. getting the flowers). She is the ‘very temper of her house’. Her servants like her and they enable her to be kind and appreciate all the good in her life. Though of course that kindness does not extend towards the educated and independent history teacher Miss Kilman, who would like to bring Clarissa to her knees. Woolf is said to have been frightened of her cook Nellie but should we confuse Clarissa with Virginia?
Mod
Maybe more like Miss Kilman would like to go down on her knees for Elizabeth...
At first, I couldn't understand why Clarissa was so disturbed by Miss Kilman, but little by little it seems that the religious issue is a smokescreen for another fear - that Miss Kilman might seduce Elizabeth in a way similar to Sally Seton's kinda-seduction of Clarissa when they were young women. Wanting the best for her daughter, Clarissa didn't want Elizabeth to stray from the proscribed paths of marriage, family, position, but as Woolf writes the scenes, you have to peer beneath the surface complaints to connect the dots. A particularly genius scene is when Woolf has Elizabeth "get on board the bus" without a thought for Miss Kilman's barely contained desire.
Yes, there's always that temptation to equate the character with the author, especially if there are obvious similarities (this novel would be a good test case). I agree, Joni,that it might be a stretch to call Clarissa shy, I was thinking more like willful. It's clear that Clarissa is in love with Sally Seton, but (I'm on page 87), I haven't caught any seductive moves on Sally's part, but if so they would be from Clarissa's perspective, right? As to those trees, on page 84 of my copy, Peter Walsh remembers the tree that fell and killed Sylvia, Clarissa's sister (I think that's right). Previously I'd taken the trees to represent the solidity of nature in contrast to the fluidity of the city, so, yes, grounding, but now?... Good old Peter makes some interesting observations when considering the tree incident including that Clarissa can never be "known" only "sketched."
I picked up on that, too, Alex. Clarissa has described being "lifted by its branches as she had seen the trees lift the mist" and "the buds of life," and yet we learn about the tragic accident with the tree... .maybe Peter Walsh's perception of nature is meant to be contrasted to that of Clarissa's and Septimus's? Clarissa does point out how different Peter's thinking is from hers and he constantly ruminates on his rationalism, which I think he sometimes feels is a handicap to "real" living.
Well, I'm about a third of the way through and it's definitely a fascinating read, though reading these messages has made me realise that I must be missing a lot...well, I can always read it again can't I?Although Virginia Woolf gets compared to Joyce there is one big difference: I get the feeling that Joyce is trying to bamboozle the reader whereas Woolf is trying to enlighten the reader. I particularly like the shifting points-of-view; again Woolf gives clues to the reader to guide us through the maze.
Years ago I read my first Woolf novel, The Voyage Out and loved it but the only thing I can remember about it was the shifting points-of-view. As 'The Voyage Out' was published in 1915 is it possible that the Joyce-Woolf influence could have been a two-way process?
I'm glad a few of you have brought up the theme of lesbianism. I understand Woolf had at least one long relationship with a woman (who later influenced the character Orlando). That being said, some of the passages concerning homosexual, specifically lesbianism, are confusing. If Clarissa is attracted to women and smitten with Sally Seton, why does she need to "protect" her daughter from the rapture of Mrs. Kilman? And what does the mother's need to protecther daughter mean in the light of Woolf's own romantic life?
I think that Clarissa had at least an idea of what lesbianism would have done to her daughter at this time period. It wasn't as "acceptable" as it is today. What mother doesn't want to protect her children from things that could hurt them. Also there is the social issue. It could destroy Clarissa's social position. I think that Woolf felt this disapproval and felt like she could not be herself and accepted.
Brain Pain
Books mentioned in this topic
The Hours (other topics)To the Lighthouse (other topics)
Mrs. Dalloway (other topics)
Orlando (other topics)
To the Lighthouse (other topics)
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Stream of consciousness more like a rushing river, with sights and sounds and thoughts public and private flowing freely through the streets and minds of mid-June London. Woolf takes us on a whitewater rafting trip with, thankfully, the occasional eddy to give us a breather and a bit of back-story. Then and now, now and then; in the moment, but not exactly; characters rush in and out of focus, some with names, others without, bumping and rushing and pausing and… well, you get the idea.
What is this mad, mid-June day in London all about? Possibly a response to an earlier mad, mid-June day in Dublin?
Septimus Warren Smith is suffering from Shell Shock. How does his story fit in with the rest of the book?
Elizabeth Dalloway is described several times as having an “oriental” look. Why is this detail mentioned so often?
Women are repeatedly compared to trees. Whadupwitdat?
(*apologies to Julie Andrews and The Grinch.)