Virginia Woolf - Life and works, Dispense di Inglese

Scarica Virginia Woolf - Life and works e più Dispense in PDF di Inglese solo su Docsity! VIRGINIA WOOLF —> Born Virginia Stephen in London in 1882, she was the daughter of Leslie Stephen, an eminent Victorian men of letters. for this reason, she grew up in a literary and intellectual atmosphere. She wasn’t allowed to attend any public schools and her mother gave her mother gave her Latin and English lessons directly. What’s more, her education consisted of the complete access to her fathers exceptional library. In 1895 at the age of 13, she lost her mother —> this event affected her deeply and provoked her first nervous breakdown, due to her mental illness (schizophrenia). She then began to revolt against her father aggressive and tyrannical character and his idealisation of the domesticated woman. It was only with her fathers death, in 1904, that Virginia felt free to begin our own life and career, so she decided to move to Bloomsbury, neighbourhood of central London. Here, together with her sister, became a member of the Bloomsbury group which included the Avangard of early 20th century London. The members were all united by the rejection of artistic convention and a disdain for bourgeois sexual codes. Between 1910 and 1915, Virginia’s mental health was precarious. In 1912, she married Leonard Woolf and during this period she entered a nursing home and attempted suicide by taking drugs. The relationship between Leonard and Virginia was calm and happy, they shared a lot of hobbies together, above all, they loved printing. Also, it provided a distraction for Virginia Woolf when writing became too stressful for her. The couple bought a handpress in 1917 for £19 (equivalent to about £1295) and taught themselves how to use it. The press was set up in the dining room of Hogarth House, where the Woolfs lived,and they founded an independent company: The Hogarth Press. In July they published their first text, a book with two stories they had written together. At the beginning of 1924, the Woolfs moved their city residence from the suburbs back to Bloomsbury, where they were less isolated from London society. Here, Virginia met and fell in love with the aristocratic novelist Vita Sackville West. They had an intense relationship and one of Woolf’s masterpiece, “Orlando”, is even devoted to Vita. The reasons for the end of the affair are unknown, but the women remained friends for the remainder of Woolf’s life. Though this is thought to be Woolf’s first and most devoted lesbian relationship, it is believed she was romantically involved with other women during her lifetime. The spread of World War II increased Virginia’s anxiety and she become haunted by the terror of losing her mind. Facing such horrors, a depressed Woolf found herself unable to write. The demons of self-doubt that she had hidden for so long returned to haunt her. On March 28, 1941, fearing that she now lacked the resilience to battle them, she walked behind Monk’s House and down to the River Ouse, put stones in her pockets, and drowned herself. • Style and themes Virginia Woolf refused the traditional way of writing and focused on the human's mental and inner experiences with his complex consciousness. So, she abandoned the traditional technique for a new literary form and style: she eliminated the traditional plot and settings and the direct dialogue and started to use an interior monologue, that focuses on character's inner and psychological life and intimate thoughts. With the literary device of the interior monologue, Woolf expressed the concept of the the human consciousness as a stream, supported by William James. Virginia also stated that: According to Bergson's philosophical theory, Virginia Woolf tried to compress the mental processes into minimum time units. One of the main characteristics of Virginia Woolf's poetic are the "moments of being". Although they are similar to Joyce’s epiphany they are not the same thing. Epiphany —> is a sudden revelation hidden between a common object. Moments of being—> are moments of perception of reality through imagination that leads to the understanding of what the reality is, behind the appearences. In her novels, Virginia Woolf explores very important themes like feminism, mental health and social inequality. For this reason her works are not only important for literature, but also for their cultural meaning —> they give us a good historical context of the 20th century and makes us understand better a lot of social issues of that time. Virginia Woolf was a pioneer of feminist literature and challenged traditional gender roles in her works. She highlights the ways in which society's constructs on femininity and masculinity limit women's opportunities and experiences (she criticizes this society constructs in Orlando for example where she talks about a man who has become a woman). The stream of conciousness helps her in this task because, by "entering" a woman's mind she can make people better understand how women are treated differentely and how they face their struggles in a male-dominated world Woolf also struggled with mental health issues and in her writings she creates a new form of psychological realism to explore how mental illnesses can affect one's vision of the world. Her characters reflect a lot of the author's psyche for example she was scared of loneliness and of socialising and she had suicidal thoughts. Mrs. Dalloway (1925) —> The story of Mrs Dalloway takes place on one single day, in one single place, London. There, a middle-aged woman, Clarissa Dalloway, is busy buying flowers and objects for the party she has organised for the evening. The narration follows her, her thoughts and her actions and tries to capture the myriad incoherent impressions that the modern city of London produces in and on her. “The mind receives a myriad impressions (…) from all sides they come, an incessant shower of innumerable atoms.”