MRS DALLOWAY

By Virginia Woolf
Introduction
◦ “Mrs Dalloway said she would buy the flowers herself.”

Characters:
◦ Mrs Dalloway (Clarissa) x Richard Dalloway, one daughter Elizabeth
◦ Peter Walsh, Sally
◦ Lucrezia x Septimus Smith

Story:
◦ Like James Joyce’s Ulysses ’a day in the life of…’
◦ Planning for a party, she is after all ‘the perfect hostess’
◦ Based on two short stories Mrs Dalloway in Bond Street and The Prime Minister
Themes
Over the years, there have been many interpretations:
◦ Feminism
◦ Homosexuality (she confesses to kissing Sally and feeling “the way men feel”)
◦ Existentialism
◦ Psychological suffering
◦ Passing of time (Big Ben)

Mostly, I think, the theme is subjectivity

Modernism in literature
◦ Action-reaction
◦ Romanticism => realism => modernism

“Look within and life, it seems, is very far from being 'like this'. Examine for a
moment and ordinary mind on an ordinary day. The mind receives a myriad of
impressions – trivial, fantastic, evanescent, or engraved with sharpness of steel.
From all sides they come, an incessant shower of innumerable atoms.”
Virginia Woolf in Modern Fiction, 1910

◦ Inward turn, look withing: focus not on objective reality, but on perception and
subjectivity
Modernism in Mrs Dalloway
◦ Mrs Dalloway = focalisor
◦ Novel reads like a stream of thoughts (although the style is what we call interior
monologue, rather than stream of consciousness): no chapters etc.
◦ The novel “flows” like thoughts do
◦ Topic sometimes switches abrublty (association)

◦ E.g. (pg. 3)
◦ E.g. (pg. 4)”For Heaven only knows why one loves it so, how one sees it so, making
it up, building it around one, tumbling it, creating it every moment afresh”
Focus on psychological well-
being of main characters
◦ Clarissa struggles with how people see her, and how she sees herself
◦ Remember: “Look within and life, it seems, is very far from being 'like this’.”
◦ She finds herself defines by the different roles she has to perform: the perfect
hostess, mother, friend, wife, but never just Clarissa
◦ Who is Clarissa and is there room for her to get to know herself?
◦ This is especially difficult since she’s so concerned about her role in society and
reputation (also of her husband)

◦ Septimus is a shell-shocked WWI-veteran

Importance
◦ New writing style
◦ New sense of self
◦ Mental illness (in a time where there was no, or only little, interest in the topic)
◦ Popular since its first publication
◦ Complex, yet good introduction to modernism
◦ Still relevant themes today (esp. feminism: How for have we come?)
For who?
Pro:
◦ Interested in the workings of the mind
◦ Very good and recognisable story, writing style is not what you’re used to
◦ If you want to try something new
◦ Under 200 pages (not too much of a commitment)
◦ Existential questions we all want to answer

Con:
◦ Style (interior monologue, no chapters)
◦ Advanced reader (or reader who’s willing to do a little research before reading)
◦ Dull? One day, so not much action as you’d like (she makes up for it, though!)