Originally I had intended to read Mrs Dalloway in February as part of my #Woolfalong reading – but I found I couldn’t wait till then. I first read Mrs Dalloway about eight years ago – and while I liked it I did feel I had missed something and it was a book I really needed to read again. I was right – I had forgotten so much of it – but I found I really liked the shifting perspectives, particularly those stories told in flashback. Time is very important throughout the novel and so there’s a lovely sense of the passing of time, of the past and present being forever linked.
Like To the Lighthouse – my first read of 2016 – Mrs Dalloway is one of Virginia Woolf’s best known novels, written in a stream of consciousness, its perspective shifts from character to character throughout the novel.
Apart from flashback reminiscences – the action takes place on one hot day in June a few years after the Great War has ended. Clarissa Dalloway is preparing for her party that evening – and as the day starts Clarissa leaves the house to begin her preparations. As Mrs Dalloway walks through the sunny London streets she is enveloped by the world around her, Big Ben strikes, she notices the shop keepers and the people in the streets. As we get a glimpse into the minds of those around her there is a wonderful sense of everyone being part of the same moment – how no one exists in complete isolation.
“One feels even in the midst of the traffic, or waking at night, Clarissa was positive, a particular hush, or solemnity; an indescribable pause; a suspense before Big Ben strikes. There! Out it boomed. First a warning, musical; then the hour, irrevocable. The leaden circles dissolved in the air. Such fools we are, she thought, crossing Victoria Street. For Heaven only knows why one loves it so, how one sees it so, making it up, building it round one, tumbling it, creating it every moment afresh; but the veriest frumps, the most dejected of miseries sitting on doorsteps (drink their downfall) do the same; can’t be dealt with, she felt positive, by Acts of Parliament for that very reason: they love life. In people’s eyes, in the swing, tramp, and trudge; in the bellow and the uproar; the carriages, motor cars, omnibuses, vans, sandwich men shuffling and swinging; brass bands; barrel organs; in the triumph and the jingle and the strange high singing of some aeroplane overhead was what she loved; life; London; this moment in June.”
The loveliness of the day reminds Mrs Dalloway of the past, her life in her family home of Bourton. As a young woman – Clarissa had been drawn to Sally Seton – who she couldn’t help but think of as ‘not an option’. In those far off days Sally was unconventional, smoking cigars, running naked down a corridor at Bourton, she appeared the epitome of the independent young woman. A kiss that Clarissa once shared with Sally; seen now as the one truly happy moment in Clarissa’s life. The complex, enigmatic Peter Walsh was a frequent visitor at Bourton in those days – whose marriage proposal Clarissa turned down. Instead Clarissa married the reliable Richard Dalloway. Later in the day the past is brought back even more forcibly with the arrival of Peter Walsh after an absence of some years in India. Delighted by the life that she sees around her that morning, Clarissa Dalloway ponders the inevitability of death.
“Did it matter then, she asked herself, walking towards Bond Street, did it matter that she must inevitably cease completely? All this must go on without her; did she resent it; or did it not become consoling to believe that death ended absolutely?”
In Regents Park close to where Clarissa lives we find Septimus Warren Smith, and his Italian born wife Lucrezia. Peter Walsh sees them too – as he walks away from Mrs Dalloway’s house. Septimus is suffering from shell shock, and like Clarissa his mind is stuck in the past. Throughout the day Septimus is subject to various hallucinations, particularly of Evans a friend lost in the war. Septimus and Lucrezia consult Sir William Bradshaw, a psychiatrist on the advice of their doctor Dr Holmes. We will meet Sir William Bradshaw again at Clarissa Dalloway’s party. Septimus has been irrevocably damaged by the war – suffering from what today we would no doubt call post-traumatic stress disorder.
“Once you fall, Septimus repeated to himself, human nature is on you. Holmes and Bradshaw are on you. They scour the desert. They fly screaming into the wilderness. The rack and the thumbscrew are applied. Human nature is remorseless.”
In the afternoon while Clarissa takes a rest, her daughter Elizabeth, seventeen and beautiful, goes out to do some shopping at the army and navy stores with Miss Kilman – her history teacher. In two glorious paragraphs Virginia Woolf tells us so much about Miss Kilman, born into a German family – originally with the name Kiehlman, she was fired from her teaching job because of it. Miss Kilman despises Clarissa Dalloway – pities her – but she adores Elizabeth.
The party begins – and it is an undoubted social success – most of the people who we have met in the novel appear. During the party Clarissa comes to hear the story of Septimus Smith. Clarissa is conscious of her position in society – she can’t help but be delighted when the Prime minister arrives.
Virginia Woolf’s writing takes considered reading – but the reader is richly rewarded, the prose is wonderfully lyrical – and she explores her characters brilliantly. I find it difficult to write about Virginia Woolf’s writing – daunted perhaps, a little over whelmed. It is complex – Woolf’s genius lies within that complexity, but also her ability to present multiple points of view – weaving their narratives in and out of each other to create a sort of tapestry of one hot day in June a few years after the end of the Great War.
If ever a novel captured the moment this is it. Lovely review, Ali. The picture at the top of the stairs at the Birmingham Museums and Art Gallery always makes me think of Mrs Dalloway.
Thank you Bridget. I think I know the picture you mean.
Lovely review Ali. “Mrs. Dalloway” was my first Woolf and I still have a sentimental spot for it. She writes like nobody else!
Oh yes, I am really beginning to appreciate how Woolf uses language.
I’m reading this one now – very slowly, however. It’s my first time through and my first time reading Woolf. I keep feeling like I’m missing something, and having to go back and re-read parts. Your review is very helpful in letting me know that I’m not too far off track so far!
I think reading it slowly is the best way, I found myself reading passages more than once too.
A lovely prelude to my reading of Mrs Dalloway in February.
Oh good, so hope you enjoy it too.
Beautiful review, Ali. My memories of this book are a little sketch and clouded by other things, but I love your commentary on the sense of everyone sharing the same moment. That’s it exactly.
Thank you. It’s impossible to remember everything about the books we read isn’t it – even those books we love. My memory of books is always letting me down.
Beautifully written! I jotted down this little note a dozen years ago- “This book feels like real life – the way we notice things during a day, and how they remind us of something, and then we think about that for a while.” That to me is the wonder of Virginia Woolf. She really pays attention to what is around her.
Yes she does, she brings everything that she experiences around her to her writing so the reader starts to see things with her eyes which is wonderful.
What a beautiful review of a novel that I definitely need to re-visit – I do think it is one of those books that benefits from re-reading
Thank you, yes I got so much from re-reading this, it’s a book well worth spending time on.
I have not yet read Virginia Woolf. It is my resolution that I should explore more of her works. Cannot decide whether to start with To the light house or Mrs. dalloway
I think Mrs Dalloway might be a good place to start – although I loved To the Lighthouse it’s probably a bit more difficult to get into.
Just ordered Mrs. Dalloway and A room of one’s own
Ooh good enjoy.
[…] so much out there on Mrs Dalloway, where can I start? Perhaps with these three recent blog reviews: Heavenali; Pechorin’s Journal; […]
Kudos to you for a terrific project! Although I won’t be following your reading schedule, I will be reading some Woolf this year and I will drop in from time to time. I just finished The Voyage Out, which was Woolf’s first novel, and enoyed it immensely. I had tried To the Lighthouse a year ago and was too baffled by the stream-of-consciousness style to finish so I’m hoping that by reading her work in chronological order over a couple of years, I will “grow into” Woolf’s style as it developed and feel less daunted by it. Happy Woolf-ing in 2016!
Thank you. I hope you continue to enjoy what you read. I think The Voyage Out is a very accomplished first novel.
Hi everybody! I`m really glad to join you from Argentina. I LOVEEEE Woolf, I’ve read To the Lighthouse a couple of times as a student and as a teacher and I still find the section ‘Time Passes’ delightful! To tell you the truth now I’ve made up my mind to give Clarissa a chance! …though I never leave Orlando apart…
Thank you all for this great project!!!!
Glad you can join us.
[…] intention of starting #Woolfalong with To the Lighthouse and/or Mrs Dalloway was to explore two of Virginia Woolf’s best known, possibly best loved novels. Many readers will […]
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