notes on Virginia Woolf / Mrs Dalloway / Clarissa's party, Appunti di Inglese

Scarica notes on Virginia Woolf / Mrs Dalloway / Clarissa's party e più Appunti in PDF di Inglese solo su Docsity! VIRGINIA WOOLF ->Virginia Woolf was a writer concerned, above all, with capturing in words the excitement, pain, beauty, and horror of the Modern Age. | She realised that a new era marked by extraordinary developments in: -urbanism -technology -warfare -consumerism -discoveries would need to be captured by a different sort of writer. | Along with Joyce and Proust, she was a relentlessly creative writer in search of new literary forms that could do justice to the complexities of modern consciousness. LIFE • She was born in 1882, in London • She grew up in a literary and intellectual atmosphere \ due to the fact that her father was a famous authors and mountaineer & Her family hosted many of the most influential and important members of Victorian Literary Society. • She had to steal an education from their father's study. • When her mother died (she was 13) Woolf had the first of a series of mental breakdowns that would plague her for the rest of her life • She joined the Bloomsbury Group, she became a journalist, and then a novelist, | An intense salon of ideas, philosophy, and theories on art and politics, of which the avant-garde of early 20th century were members. \ ——> which included John Maynard Keynes, | E. M. Forster, and Lytton Strachey. This group believed in - traditional morality - Victorian respectability - rejection of artistic convention • She married one of the members: the writer and journalist, Leonard Woolf. • She and Leonard bought a small hand printing press, named it "The Hogarth Press,” | of which they published books from their dining room. | They printed Woolf's radical novels and political essays when no one else would and they produced the first full English edition of Freud's works. • In just four short years between World Wars I and II, Woolf wrote four of her famous works: "Mrs. Dalloway," "To the Lighthouse," "Orlando," and the essay, "A Room of One's Own.” • In 1941, she had another mental breakdowns, and she drowned her self in the river ouse WOOLF’S WORKS | Virginia Woolf literature was influenced by various events that occurred during her life: - First the intellectual environment in which she grew up \ considering that her father was a Victorian man of Letters with an incredible library that she had access to. - Then the summer vacations spent at St Ives, Cornwell, | where the sea that surrounded her will become a central symbol in her future work. - However the most deeply felt events where the death of her mother that caused her first nervous breakdown, and then the death of her tyrannical father that finally set her free to live the life she intended to • 1915 “The voyage out” • 1925 “Mrs Dalloway” • 1927 “To the lighthouse” • 1928 “Orlando” • “ A room of one’s own • 1931 “The Waves” WOOLF'S AIM | She wanted to give voice to the inner world of felling and memories. | She didn’t care about the events of a story, but instead what the characters left the readers “MRS DALLOWAY” —> Mrs Dalloway is a novel written by the novelist Virginia Woolf. | this novel is essentially plotless, as very little actually happens. as a matter of fact it takes place in a single day \——> a Wednesday in mid-June 1923 SETTING -> London in 1923———-> in post-World War I London ->But because the characters are so haunted by the past, the reader is taken away from London several times. PLOT ->The novel examines one day in the life of Clarissa Dalloway, | an upper-class Londoner married to a member of Parliament. | She is preparing to give a party in her London home. ->She begins her day running an errand to purchase the flowers for the party. Throughout the morning, Clarissa reflects on her past, including her decision to marry Richard Dalloway , rather than her more fiery suitor Peter Walsh. ->Meanwhile, the second storyline begins with Septimus Smith, a shellshocked war veteran, out on the street with his wife, Lucrezia. | \—> Septimus struggles with the aftereffects of the war, hearing voices and feeling that life has little meaning | for example he continues to have conversations with his friend, who died during the war . | Then a car backfiring paralyzes him, and he reflects on his life. ->Clarissa has returned home and begins to remember a special friendship she shared in her youth with Sally Seton, a vivacious, slightly scandalous young woman. The two shared a special bond, bordering on a crush, and Clarissa remembers a kiss they shared. ->Clarissa then starts mending a dress for her occasion | | when she receives an unexpected visit from Peter Walsh. \/ Clarissa and Peter talk to each other easily about the present, but both are thinking of their past and the decisions they made to get them to the place they are now. -> Clarissa's 17-year-old daughter Elizabeth enters and Peter ends his visit. ->Peter goes to a park where Septimus and Lecrezia are also walking. The couple get into a heated discussion about suicide, and Peter sees them as a young and in love couple quarreling. He doesn't realize the depth of their emotions or how unsteady Septimus is. Lecrezia has made an appointment for Septimus to see a specialist, Sir William Bradshaw, who dismisses the complexity of Septimus's madness and suggests a rest in an asylum to get more perspective. ->Meanwhile, Richard Dalloway has been to lunch with Lady Bruton. Clarissa was somewhat miffed that Lady Bruton invited only Richard and not her, and sees it as a remark on Clarissa's validity. Richard has realized during this lunch that he wants to come home and tell Clarissa that he loves her. Unfortunately, he never finds the words, as he has gone so many years without saying them. ->Clarissa goes to see Elizabeth, who is studying with her tutor, Doris Kilman. Clarissa despises Doris, who she sees as a monster with "hooves" taking her daughter from her. Doris also despises Clarissa, largely for her bourgeois ways and financial means. ->Septimus and Lecrezia go to their apartment to wait for the attendants who will take him to the asylum. When they arrive, Septimus decides to escape from them, and not wanting to leave life but not wanting to meet the attendants, he jumps out the window to his death. ->Clarissa’s party is underway, with several ghosts from her past – including Peter Walsh and Sally Seton – in attendance. Richard has still been unable to tell her that he loves her. Very late into the party, Sir William and Lady Bradshaw arrive, very apologetic for their tardiness. Lady Bradshaw explains that they were delayed as one of Sir William's patients (Septimus) had committed suicide that day. The party ends with Clarissa surprisingly disappointed at the success of her party. STYLE The style of Mrs Dalloway is complex, psychological, intricate, and dense. • Virginia Woolf’s technique is similar to that of a collage: In fact | Rather than a complete description, she presents pieces of the past and present, of thoughts and reactions, which fit together to create a whole picture • Woolf also employs the techniques of the stream of consciousness and the interior monologue \——> however differently from other modernist, Virginia never lets the caos of the thoughts take control. What happens in the mind of her | characters is logical and well organised. \/ In fact her technique blends the steam of thought into a third person, past tense narrative \ in a way that she makes the inner and outer world seem connected. | So through Clarissa’s interior monologues and those of other characters, we are given insight into Mrs Dalloway’s character. \———————————-> Mrs. Dalloway is essentially plotless; what action there is takes place mainly in the characters’ consciousness. • Real communication is almost impossible to achieve since each individual has his own idea of reality and truth; situations have a different effect and produce different reactions and feelings in different characters. Clarissa herself realizes that she changes, or appears different, depending on whom she is with. • “Moments of being” is when life’s pattern is perceive through a sudden shock, It is the moment in which a person sees reality, and his or her place in it, clearly. • Use of flashback “CLARISSA’S PARTY” -> “Clarissa’s party” is a passage taken from the 9 part of the novel “Mrs Dalloway” SUMMARY This passage is set at Clarissa’s party. His guests, Sir William Bradshaw, Septimus's doctor, and lady Bradshaw explain why they are late, and then they told Clarissa that a young man has committed suicide | The young man is Septimus Warren Smith. | Clarissa is annoyed by the fact that the Bradshaw talk about death at the party. | But then she started to identifies her self with the young man and wonders why he has killed himself. ->She goes in a room to think and sees an old woman starring at her from the window in the opposite room; she is alone and going to bed. Clarissa hears her guests laughing and shouting; the clock striking the hour. Then she decides to go back to her guests; to find Sally and Peter, two old friends of her. Clarissa's thoughts about the past and the present can be found in the text. Richard (her husband) is a conventional man and Clarissa feels protected and reassured by him. Their relationship is not based on love and passion but provides her with shelter from her weaknesses and insecurities. Clarissa experiences a moment of clarity or "being" when she realises that the social life she values so much is false and superficial. However, she accepts herself and chooses to go on living. Unlike Septimus, who is not always able to distinguish to his personal response and the nature of external reality; Clarissa never loses her awareness of the outside world as something external to herself. In the end she recognises her deception, accepts the idea of engine and of death and is prepared to go on. CLARISSA’S PARTY = MODERNISM In the passage there are many features of the modernist fiction: • The use of consciousness as the main character's way of communication with herself and others. • Use of 3tr person past tense narrative • The characters are introduced through their perception, thoughts and felling. • There is continuous shift from inner to external time and viceversal • The use of mixing of images from the past and the present | From line 8 to line 15 Clarissa brings her thoughts to a moment of her past