Questions, Resources and General Banter - The Waves

[Jim]

This thread is for any questions you may have about Virginia Woolf and her novel The Waves.

If you have any links to resources, interviews, criticism, organizations, etc., please share them here.

And of course, if you just want to shoot the breeze about all things Woolf, then have at it!!!

Also, if you’ve written a review of the book, please post a link to share with the group.

[Jim]

Here are a few links to get you started.

Virginia Woolf wikipedia page

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Virginia...


The Waves wikipedia page

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Waves


Virginia Woolf Society of Great Britain

http://www.virginiawoolfsociety.co.uk/


The International Virginia Woolf Society

http://www.utoronto.ca/IVWS/

[Jim]

Virginia Woolf chose to end her life in 1941. Thanks to Australian copyright law, which says that public domain means 70 years after a writers death, Woolf's copyright expired this year. Here are few links for ebooks and PDF versions of her work:

Project Gutenberg Australia

http://gutenberg.net.au/ebooks02/0201...


Feedbooks - Woolf page and The Waves page. Kindle versions available here

http://www.feedbooks.com/author/206

http://www.feedbooks.com/book/1230/th...

[Alasse]

Thanks, Jim! I downloaded a translation this morning. I'm usually pretty good at judging a translation by flipping a few pages and doing some diagonal reading. But the style of this one does not make that approach very helpful ;) So I think I'll download both and compare.

[Jim]

Alasse wrote: "Thanks, Jim! I downloaded a translation this morning. I'm usually pretty good at judging a translation by flipping a few pages and doing some diagonal reading. But the style of this one does not ma..."

Are you talking about translation into Spanish? Or are you talking about comparing versions in English?

Anyway, if you have any recommendations of one version over another, please share....

[Alasse]

Oh no, I meant Spanish translation vs. original. I still haven't decided which I'm going to do. For me it's usually a mixture of fiction vs. nonfiction, complexity, price and availability.

In case it helps, Feedbooks versions tend to be very nicely formatted :)

[Jim]

Alasse wrote: "Oh no, I meant Spanish translation vs. original. I still haven't decided which I'm going to do. For me it's usually a mixture of fiction vs. nonfiction, complexity, price and availability.

In case..."

Gracias!

[Bill]

Alasse,

Since you read English so well, I'd try the original and see if it's too much of a problem. I think the pleasure here IS the use of language even if it's easier to talk about what Woolf is doing from the point of view of a narrative. This woman could WRITE! If you can read it in English, I'd do that -- or at least have an English version handy.

[Andreea]

Another good website for Virginia Woolf is the
Clemenson University Virginia Woolf page. It's not very new and some of the off-site links are not working, but it offers some good support material, including a detailed summary of the plot on episodes and a table of the characters and a quite detailed description of each of them. I've found that keeping track of who's speaking is one of the biggest difficulty of the book so it should come in handy. :)

[Jenny]

In the interest of the group discussion, I do have a lot of links and stuff to Virginia Woolf. On the "Mentors" page of my blog there are the articles I worked on earlier this year (you don't have to read them) but if you have time there are links scattered throughout. Some stuff from the Guardian on the anniversary of her death and whatnot.

http://placeforthestolen.blogspot.com...

[Jenny]

Bill wrote: "This woman could WRITE!"

YES!!!!!!!!!!!

[Jim]

Jenny wrote: "In the interest of the group discussion, I do have a lot of links and stuff to Virginia Woolf. On the "Mentors" page of my blog there are the articles I worked on earlier this year (you don't have ..."

I read your post about her suicide and 'meaning it'. I realized that the reads for 2012 begin and end with writers who both suffered from lifelong depression and who both took their own lives - Woolf and Wallace. As you said, writing is not a solution to problems. Food for thought...

[Filipe]

It´s funny optional suicide is always seen as a decision of people with depression and/or other mental diseases. Can´t they just kill themselves because they think (their) life sucks? (Not specially speaking of Woolf here). But since she´s part of the main theme, couldn´t she have decided to kill herself because she didn´t want to live with her disease and not because her disease made her do it?

[Haaze]

Does anybody have statistics on any correlation between readers of this genre of literature and suicide rates? Just wondering in the light of Jim's previous post on depression....

[Ellen]

I think in the case of an illness like bi-polar, it becomes difficult to separate the person from the illness. In its more benign stages, the illness fuels creativity, at its worst it destroys it. "Choosing" not to live with it is a bit like "choosing" not to live with a gun pointed at one's head: it seems a bit academic to me. Perhaps I have known too many people with this illness to look at it with any detachment.

[Luke]

Haaze wrote: "Does anybody have statistics on any correlation between readers of this genre of literature and suicide rates? Just wondering in the light of Jim's previous post on depression...."

You mean writers right? Otherwise we're all potential statistics...
There's a wiki category of writers who committed suicide. It'd take some going through though to find ones within this genre, though.

[Andreea]

Haaze wrote: "Does anybody have statistics on any correlation between readers of this genre of literature and suicide rates? Just wondering in the light of Jim's previous post on depression...."

To the best of my knowledge, the clearest link between reading and mental health is a correlation between illiteracy and a significantly higher risk of mental health problems, including suicide. So not being able to read is a greater risk than reading books which discuss suicide, even if they glorify it (not saying that Woolf does).

[Bill]

Filipe wrote, It´s funny optional suicide is always seen as a decision of people with depression and/or other mental diseases. Can´t they just kill themselves because they think (their)life sucks? (Not specially speaking of Woolf here). But since she´s part of the main theme, couldn´t she have decided to kill herself because she didn´t want to live with her disease and not because her disease made her do it?

If you're talking about about severe depression, I'm not sure that's a distinction with a difference.

[Filipe]

Bill, but if the disease makes you kill yourself this is a non-optional suicide, if you kill yourself because you don´t want to live or you don´t want to live with your disease, then it´s an optional suicide. Can it even exist a disease that literally creates the will in ones mind to kill oneself? Or it´s just the stressful sensations/situations originated by the disease that let a person think for himself about suicide. Anyway, mental diseases are serious and fragile subjects, I suffered several wrong diagnosis in the hand of blind/evil doctors, which costed me greatly in every single aspect of my life. Like religion I respect psychiatry in a "if it floats your boat" basis. Not my thing, though.

[Jenny]

Filipe wrote: But since she´s [Woolf] part of the main theme, couldn´t she have decided to kill herself because she didn´t want to live with her disease and not because her disease made her do it?

Hm, after reading her diaries and a lot of her work, I would be disinclined - just from a reader's standpoint and viewing her as a 'character' in her own diaries; I am no diagnostician - to say that she could have separated the the depression/bipolar and her stressors in a rational enough way to make suicide an option wherein she had a real choice...however, it's always risky to start reading all author-biography into the work, isn't it?

But, as far as a literary presentation of the suicide question goes, the character of Septimus (in Mrs. Dalloway) is a very pointed-to character in literature as far as a psychological breakdown of PTSD/depression. And his suicide doesn't seem, to me anyway, to be an 'option' for him. Everything ties back to his thought process, which is unhealthy, unhopeful, and it seems to me (though a very good argument could be made otherwise) only partly because of his stressors. And I think Woolf presents that very well, and very gracefully.

The Waves will be a great read! I'm so excited.

[Bill]

I'm sorry about your difficulties, Filipe. And there is much that can be laid at the feet of the psychiatric community -- and I've just read a couple of books about that. :-) But this is probably not best forum to discuss psychiatry.

[Filipe]

Thanks for the consideration, Bill. I have myself a good deal to say about psychiatry but here is definately not the place. I never intent to attack anything but to evaluate the base of everything.

[Jim]

Filipe wrote: "Thanks for the consideration, Bill. I have myself a good deal to say about psychiatry but here is definately not the place. I never intent to attack anything but to evaluate the base of everything."

Luckily, there's an app for that a thread for that:

http://www.goodreads.com/topic/show/7...

Please feel free to continue your thoughts about psychiatry on the couch....

Regarding suicide and depression, with Woolf, her illness is well-documented. Whether she chose to end her life or if the illness "made her do it" is a question we can't answer because we did not occupy her mind or her emotions.

With Wallace, he too had a well-documented struggle with depression. Jonathan Franzen, in a New Yorker article (much-criticized by DFW devotees) from April 18, 2011, suggested that his suicide was partially a result of discontinuing his medication and intentionally undermining his psychiatric care. Franzen's ideas aside, we can't know for sure why DFW chose suicide either.

Suicide is a big topic in literature and life at-large. Definitely worth discussing over on the 'Tell Uncle Siggy..." thread.

[Filipe]

Jim, you got the point I wanted: the intangibility of the information and more examples at hand. I think this is a fascinating subject, suicide and mental diseases relations with writing and writers.

[Bill]

I don't know how much you care about Woolf, but the Hermoine Lee biography is quite brilliant -- haven't finished it -- but it's a real miracle of biography.

[El]

I haven't read that bio, but I did read Lee's Edith Wharton which was so detailed and so interesting (for fans of Wharton anyway) - I can imagine she put the same amount of time and energy into researching for Woolf as well. I need that bump that one up.

[Bill]

El,

Actually, the Woolf book might have even gotten better notices. It's kind of exceptional.

[Jim]

Bill wrote: "El,

Actually, the Woolf book might have even gotten better notices. It's kind of exceptional."

Can you post the title and/or a GR link for us? Merci!

[Lily]

Jim wrote: "Bill wrote: "El,

Actually, the Woolf book might have even gotten better notices. It's kind of exceptional."

Can you post the title and/or a GR link for us? Merci!"

Virginia Woolf by Hermione Lee

[Bill]

Sorry, missed that and Lily graciously beat me to it. And I continue beaten, but unbowed. :-)

[Lily]

Bill wrote: "Sorry, missed that and Lily graciously beat me to it. And I continue beaten, but unbowed. :-)"

Well, it wasn't exactly difficult to figure out, Eman found the Jeffersonian turn-table for me a few weeks ago, and I figure you'll probably return the favor one day, maybe with even the flourish of a bow. :) This time, I'll curtsy and exit stage left.

[Bill]

Stop, Lily -- remember, it's stage right! As you leave you run into the ghost of Virginia Woolf. :-)

[Corina]

Oh...I just started Hermione Lee`s book about Virginia Woolf and I must say that I`m thrilled that I bought it. Found it at a charity shop for the unbelievable sum of 4.50 pounds. :) Thanks for the suggestion.

[Corina]

Oh...I just started Hermione Lee`s book about Virginia Woolf and I must say that I`m thrilled that I bought it. Found it at a charity shop for the unbelievable sum of 4.50 pounds. :) Thanks for the suggestion.

[Bill]

I read 200 pages and stopped deciding I wanted to read more Woolf first. But my impression was that it was the single best biography I'd ever read.

[Lily]

A new scholarly work on The Waves is scheduled to be released January 16: Language, Time, and Identity in Woolf's The Waves: The Subject in Empire's Shadow by Michael Weinman.

It apparently draws heavily on the work of critic/philosopher Judith Butler.

Michael Weinman

[Ashley]

Lily wrote: "A new scholarly work on The Waves is scheduled to be released January 16: Language, Time, and Identity in Woolf's The Waves: The Subject in Empire's Shadow by Michael Weinman.

It apparently draws..."

Thanks for the info! This looks very interesting. And I love Judith Butler, so I'll definitely have to check this out.

[Lily]

Bill wrote: "...remember she grew up in a home with a father conspicuously associated with atheism..."

Sidebar comment: It won't particularly belong to us, but I suspect the next generation of Western writers will have moved far further from access (conscious or unconscious) to the traditions, rhythms, and stories of the Bible, given present public educational systems. I make no judgment on that here, other than to say it will be very different from Victorian English writing.

(Brought this here from another thread so as not to interfere with its main discussion.)

[Jim]

Relocated from another discussion:

Lily Wrote: Jim wrote: "And even more intriguing, why are these ambitions restricted to the male characters?..."

Well, I'll throw out two speculations that might be totally irrelevant. (view spoiler)[First, Woolf apparently argued with herself whether her narrators were separate characters. Second, in Orlando, she had already played with the movement between female and male identity. Was writing masculine?

“She wrote amusedly [sic] of one review: ‘Odd, that they (The Times) should praise my characters when I meant to have none' (Diary IV, 47)."

“Woolf explained in one letter,

'The six characters are supposed to one. I’m getting old myself – I shall be fifty next year, and I come to feel more and more how difficult it is to collect oneself into one Virginia; even though the special Virginia in whose body I live for the moment is violently susceptible to all sorts of separate feelings. Therefore I wanted to give the sense of continuity.' (Letters IV, 397)"

For more, explore Jocelyn Rodal, "One World, One Life...":

http://dspace.mit.edu/bitstream/handle/1... (hide spoiler)]

[Bill]

I'm confused why this is a spoiler. And is suspense really an issue with The Waves

I think the question of whether the characters are one or many is something of a mug's game since to some extent that would be true of any deeply felt novel. Of course, with Virginia there was the problem of voices in her head being manifestations of something more serious.

I'd note that Eliot said the same thing about "The Waste Land" -- all the men blend into one man, all the women into one woman -- and they are both combined in Tiresias.

But I don't know how useful that is as an idea. What exactly does it illuminate or explain or give force to?

[Jim]

Bill wrote: "I'm confused why this is a spoiler. And is suspense really an issue with The Waves

I think the question of whether the characters are one or many is something of a mug's game since to some exten..."

For those who don't like to read the introduction/commentary before they read the book. This way, they can discover on their own what may or may not be the author's intent.

[Whitney]

Bill wrote: "I'm confused why this is a spoiler. And is suspense really an issue with The Waves

I think the question of whether the characters are one or many is something of a mug's game since to some exten..."

In most cases I completely agree about it not adding anything to the discussion, but here Woolf herself commented on the intended unity / seperateness of her characters, which I think makes it worth consideration (in the end it may be irrelevant, at this point I can't say).

As far as 'spoilers', I'd say suspense comes in many different flavors. People may want to experience the narrative unfolding in the way intended by the writer, so when in doubt a spoiler warning is an easy way to avoid annoying people or affecting their enjoyment of a book.

[Jim]

Whitney wrote: "In most cases I completely agree about it not adding anything to the discussion, but here Woolf herself commented on the intended unity / seperateness of her characters, which I think makes it worth consideration (in the end it may be irrelevant, at this point I can't say)...."

Yes, it may appear I'm being overly spoiler-sensitive here, but I've read many comments in other groups by people who prefer to let the text speak before they listen to what the author and commentators have to say. I don't think there is any suspense to be worried about, but Woolf's comments here have the potential to be a voice in the reader's head that they might not want to hear before the read is finished.

In my own case, I always read introductions first, as well as other references. So to each his own!

[Jim]

Lily wrote: "Bill wrote: "But I don't know how useful that is as an idea. What exactly does it illuminate or explain or give force to? ..."

I brought the ideas here as a speculative response to Jim's question ..."

No slapping allowed! LOL!

I hear what you're both saying. Ideally, we would all read the text cover-to-cover before the discussions start - and therefore, no worry about spoilers - but the general conventions of GR are to read the texts in bite-sized, weekly pieces that the average reader can accomplish each week. This practice allows for the greatest number of people possible to (sort of) all be on the same page during a given discussion.

For The Waste Land, Bill will launch the discussion of the text as a whole during the first week, then broken down into smaller parts in the following weeks, so again no worry about spoilers.

Anyway, thanks to you both for going with the flow!

[Bill]

Whitney,

I know it was her comment, and I'm sure it meant something to her. I'm not sure whether it means anything in the context of thinking about "The Waves". So she said it, so what? Maybe it wasn't her best idea.

My problem is not merely what did it mean. The problem is what could it possibly mean?

_____

Lily,

I do wonder if the issue with not having a female writer -- and obviously she herself was a writer -- was that it just wasn't a political issue. Women novelists were no rarity. Remember Miss Prism's 3-volume novel in The Importance of Being Earnest which was accidentally exchanged for the baby.

Or perhaps that she didn't particular want a character based primarily on herself -- or of one that people would assume was based on herself.

One thing there was 19th century tradition of it was women writing novels -- from Jane Austen to George Sand to George Eliot, and it continued into the 20th century.

[Ashley]

Jim wrote: "Yes, it may appear I'm being overly spoiler-sensitive here, but I've read many comments in other groups by people who prefer to let the text speak before they listen to what the author and commentators have to say...."

I for one do appreciate the spoiler sensitivity, Jim. I'm one of those people who hates any spoilers no matter what the genre. It has nothing to do with suspense, for me, simply the desire to enter into the experience with as few preconceived notions or expectations as possible. I find it a much more enjoyable experience when the author is able to surprise me, whether it is through plot, character development, or any other aspect.

I understand, Bill, that this is not as feasible with classic literature, so I don't get as upset if something is spoiled. But I do appreciate when people are considerate of those of us whom spoilers bother.

[Bill]

Then, Ashley, my suggestion would be -- and this isn't personal, it's my general suggestion for all spoiler haters -- read the book ahead of time, as Lily suggested. The announcements are far enough in advance.

I remained strongly opposed to limiting the discussion -- because often the larger context is what's most interesting.

[Ashley]

Don't worry, Bill, I didn't take it personally :) It is a good suggestion, and I will try to do so. This time around, I didn't have time to read the book ahead of time (the holidays, etc). But in the future, when I have time, I will probably read the book through before-hand, then go back and re-read the sections each week on which we will focus. I can understand your opposition to limiting the discussion, and I'm sure there are others who feel that way as well.

[Whitney]

Bill wrote: "Then, Ashley, my suggestion would be -- and this isn't personal, it's my general suggestion for all spoiler haters -- read the book ahead of time, as Lily suggested. The announcements are far enou..."

Normally, yes, it's ridiculous for someone to join a book discussion and complain that people are discussing all aspects of the book. In this case, however, the announcements (made far in advance) specified only discussing portions of the book until the last week. I quote "As mentioned elsewhere, to avoid spoilers, please be sure to observe the pages listed for the weekly threads and refrain from commenting beyond the highest page number posted. " I understand it's restrictive and limiting, but it's the rule of the group, and it’s only in effect for a limited time. If you feel you can't join the discussion without going beyond the week's reading, put a spoiler warning or wait until the 23rd - your comments will be just as salient in 3 weeks as they are today.

I'm personally not that spoiler sensitive, just trying to be considerate to those who are and are reading the boards based on how they were represented.

[Bill]

Whitney,

Actually, my comments have a limited shelf life and start to spoil after a week.

I'm not really concerned about The Waves . I'm really suggesting the group move to different rules down the road. Ultimately, I think it diminishes the discussions.

Of course, "The Waste Land" is about 17 pages long so reading in advance should not be a burden.