Virginia Woolf: A Literary Genius and Her Groundbreaking Works, Appunti di Inglese

Scarica Virginia Woolf: A Literary Genius and Her Groundbreaking Works e più Appunti in PDF di Inglese solo su Docsity! Virginia Woolf (1882-1941) years: nia Stephen (later Woolf) was born in London in 1882 * She was the daughter of Julia Jackson Duckworth, a member of Duckworth publishing family, and Leslie Stephen, a very respected victorian critic * She grew up within a large and talented family, meeting many eminent personalities (inluding Henry James and Eliot) and learning Greek form the sister of critic Walter Pater. Tragic events characterized her childhood: Traumas * Her older half-brothers sexually abused her * Her mother died in 1895, causing Virginia’s first mental breakdown * Probably she hada genetic predisposition to bipolar disorder * She was very close to many intellectuals of that time The Bloomsbury Group * She moved to a London district, named Bloomsbury, which later became associated with the group of scholars among whom she moved * The Bloomsbury Group was an intellectual circle frequented by well-known intellectuals * Itwas one of the main centre of London's intelligentsia * Amodern prespective: The group’s liberal views strongly contributed to Virginia’ creativity and freedom of thinking about gender relations. Marriage and relationships In 1912 she married Leonard Woolf. Together they found the publishing house The Hogarth Press 13 years later after her marriage, Virginia fell in love with the poet Victoria Vita Sackville-West . Their romance would later inspire Virginia to write her novel Orlando (1928) Mental health and death Underneath Woolf°s liveliness lay psychological tensions; she was subject to periods of strong depression, especially after finishing a book In March 1941 she drowned herself ina river, probably because of her dread of world war II Artistie approach As awriter, Woolf rebelled against materialism of some of the novelists of early XX century and tried to render more intricately the aspects of consciousness in which the truth of human experience existed * Inher essay Modem Fiction she defines the task of novelists as looking within the mind receiving a myriad impressions « She did notwantto describe life from the outside but from the inside since she wanted to explore the consciousness * She abandoned linear narration in favor of interior monologue and stream of consciousness (with punctuation) Works * She wrotetwo realistic works: 1. The voyage out (1915) 2. Night & Day (1919) * While intensely psychological her works also found inspiration in physical, every day reality, as in Monday or Tuesday * Hernarration is characterized by a fZow and she brought into novels themes, elements and images of lyric poetry Mr s. Dalloway (1925) The first completely successful realization of her style * Like Ulysses the action takes place over the course of a single day * The story alternates between that of the protagonist, a lady of London high society, and that of Septimus, a young man mentally destroy ed by the experience of war, who commits suicide at the end. They are presented through psychological portraits. * Reality is not presented as objective but rather as subjectively perceive by the characters. It triggers a series of thought in their minds. * The passing oftime is marked 17 times by the chiming of the clock Orlando (1928) * Itis anautobiographical work inspired by her relationship with Vita Sackville-West, Orlando is the biography of an androgyne whose adventure progress for other four centuries. * The main characters periodically undergo changes of sexes The waves Here Woolf chose to make narration disappear in favor of a flow of voices is her most experimental work Essays * Virginia Woolf was also a prolific reviewer and essayist e Incontrast with the formal language of many literary arenas, from which women were historically barred, she ‘wrote in an informal and personal tone, polemical in a playful way * Overthe years she also became increasingly concerned with the position of women and the constriction they were forced to * In1929 she wrote A room ofone $ own in which she describes the issues historically male institution ha with ‘women * She advocatedthe androgynous in mind: a female literature which could resonate with men To the lighthouse (1927) To the lighthouse (1927) * Tothe Lighthouse is marked by similar technical innovations, all designed to give space to inner experience * Itis her way to deal with some issues of the memory of her family * The major events of the historical background are not very important for the plot, what counts are “epiphanies” the moments of illumination General overview * Virginia Woolf* Sth novel and one of the seminal texts in the Modernist canon (it also deals with the radical break towards Victorian A ge) * The stream-of-consciousness approach differs from Joyce”s in Ulysses, whereas Joyce is more experimental in his narrative technique, Woolf always maintains a logical and grammatical organization * Time places a fundamental role: she defines this work as an elegy The Proust effect Woolf was influenced by Marcel Proust and his seven volume work which is characterized by the recurring theme of involuntary memory Life as a “luminous halo” Similarly Woolf wanted to free herself “from the tyranny of the plot” to render the subjective reality of her characters” minds. In her essay Modern Fiction, Woolf observed that previous writers had described life from the “outside”, without rendering the “reality of existence”, which is a complex combinations of a “myriad” of subjective impressions, not a series of events in a precise order. The setting * To the Lighthouse revolves around the Ramsays, a large and wealthy family, who — ‘when the novel starts — are staying at their own holiday house together with their guests. The house is in the Hebrides archipelago, off the west coast of mainland Scotland Characters: * The main character is Mrs. Ramsay, the matriarch of the family, a kind and patient woman, committed to the well- being ofher guests and her family. *. Mr. Ramsay, her husband, a philosopher, is more short-tempered and rude, but also more insecure. * Mr. and Mrs. Ramsay have eight children, James and Camilla (“Cam”) being the most relevant ones in the novel. Both James and Cam have a difficult in their relationship with their father, because of his oppressive personality. Lily Broscoe She is a young, talented but initially insecure painter and one of the Ramsey’s guests, together with Mr. Bankes and Charles Tansley. Her anxieties about her career are worsened by Mr. Ramsey’s domineering personality and Tansley”s unpleasant remark about women but he looks for other?s approbation and he secretly is in love with Mrs. Ramsey. Plot 1 * The Window (part one) is set before world war I. The action spans approximately 7 hours and it is set at the summer house ofthe Ramsey ’s. They are hosting a group of friends. They interact among each other discovering more about their struggles. * Lily starts a painting of but she is so unsure and undermined by about her talent that she leaves her painting unfinished *. MrRamsey and Mrs Ramsey’s youngest son, expresses his desire to go to the lighthouse across the bay. * Evenifhis father remarks that weather won°t be good enough to reach the lighthouse but his mother holds out hope of making the trip. * Time passes isa brief section which covers a decade, between the first and the third section. * Itisa succintenarration given through a third person narration