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Mrs Dalloway

Mrs Dalloway original cover
Author	Virginia Woolf
Country	United Kingdom
Language	English
Genre(s)	Novel
Publisher	Hogarth Press
Publication date	1925
Media type	Print (Hardback & Paperback)
ISBN	N/A

Mrs Dalloway (1925) is a novel by Virginia Woolf detailing a day in the life of protagonist Clarissa Dalloway in post-World War I England. Mrs Dalloway is one of Woolf's best-known novels, owing in part to the popularity of Michael Cunningham's Pulitzer Prize-winning novel The Hours, and Stephen Daldry's movie of the same name. Image File history File links Circle-question. ... Image File history File links No higher resolution available. ... For the American childrens writer, see Virginia Euwer Wolff Virginia Woolf (née Stephen) (January 25, 1882 – March 28, 1941) was an English novelist and essayist regarded as one of the foremost modernist literary figures of the twentieth century. ... In political geography and international politics, a country is a political division of a geographical entity, a sovereign territory, most commonly associated with the notions of state or nation and government. ... The English language is a West Germanic language that originates in England. ... A novel (from French nouvelle Italian novella, new) is an extended, generally fictional narrative, typically in prose. ... A publisher is a person or entity which engages in the act of publishing. ... The Hogarth Press was founded in 1917 by Leonard and Virginia Woolf. ... Year 1925 (MCMXXV) was a common year starting on Thursday (link will display the full calendar) of the Gregorian calendar. ... This article or section does not cite any references or sources. ... To meet Wikipedias quality standards, this article may require cleanup. ... ISBN-13 represented as EAN-13 bar code (in this case ISBN 978-3-16-148410-0) The International Standard Book Number, ISBN, is a unique[1] commercial book identifier barcode. ... A novel (from French nouvelle Italian novella, new) is an extended, generally fictional narrative, typically in prose. ... For the American childrens writer, see Virginia Euwer Wolff Virginia Woolf (née Stephen) (January 25, 1882 – March 28, 1941) was an English novelist and essayist regarded as one of the foremost modernist literary figures of the twentieth century. ... “The Great War ” redirects here. ... Motto (French) God and my right Anthem No official anthem - the United Kingdom anthem God Save the Queen is commonly used England() – on the European continent() – in the United Kingdom() Capital (and largest city) London (de facto) Official languages English (de facto) Unified  -  by Athelstan 927 AD  Area  -  Total 130... Michael Cunningham (born November 6, 1952) is an award-winning American writer, best known for his 1998 novel The Hours, which won the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction in 1999. ... The Pulitzer Prize for Fiction has been awarded since 1948 for distinguished fiction by an American author, preferably dealing with American life. ... The Hours is a novel written by Michael Cunningham. ... Stephen David Daldry, CBE (born May 2, 1961 in Dorset, England, United Kingdom) is a British movie director and producer. ... This article or section does not cite any references or sources. ...

Plot introduction

The novel follows Clarissa Dalloway throughout a single day in post-Great War England in a stream of consciousness narrative. Created from two short stories "Mrs Dalloway in Bond Street" and the unfinished "The Prime Minister" the novel's story is of Clarissa's preparations for a party of which she is to be hostess. With the interior perspective of the novel, the story travels forwards and back in time, and in and out of the characters' minds, to construct a complete image of Clarissa's life and of the inter-war social structure. In literary criticism, stream of consciousness is a literary technique which seeks to portray an individuals point of view by giving the written equivalent of the characters thought processes. ...

Because of structural and stylistic similarities, Mrs Dalloway is commonly thought to be a response to James Joyce's Ulysses, a text that is commonly hailed as one of the greatest novels of the Twentieth Century. Woolf herself derided Joyce's masterpiece (the Hogarth Press, run by her and her husband Leonard, turned down the chance to publish the novel in England). Fundamentally, however, Mrs Dalloway treads new ground and seeks to portray a different aspect of the human experience. James Augustine Aloysius Joyce (Irish Séamus Seoighe; 2 February 1882 – 13 January 1941) was an Irish expatriate writer, widely considered to be one of the most influential writers of the 20th century. ... Ulysses is a novel by James Joyce, first serialized in parts in the American journal The Little Review from March 1918 to December 1920, and then published in its entirety by Sylvia Beach on February 2, 1922, in Paris. ... (19th century - 20th century - 21st century - more centuries) Decades: 1900s 1910s 1920s 1930s 1940s 1950s 1960s 1970s 1980s 1990s The 20th century lasted from 1901 to 2000 in the Gregorian calendar (often from (1900 to 1999 in common usage). ... Leonard Woolf (November 25, 1880 – August 14, 1969) married Virginia Woolf in 1912. ...

Analysis

The novel itself is preoccupied with a number of issues. Foremost are feminism and madness displayed by the characters Clarissa Dalloway and Septimus Warren Smith. As a commentary on inter-war society, Clarissa's character highlights the role of women as the proverbial "Angel in the House" and embodies both sexual and economic repression. Septimus, as the shell-shocked war hero, operates as a pointed criticism of the treatment of insanity and depression. Woolf lashes out at the medical discourse through Septimus's decline and ultimate suicide. Similarities in Septimus's condition to Woolf's own struggles with manic depression (they both hallucinate that birds sing in Greek, and Woolf once attempted to throw herself out a window as Septimus finally does) lead many to read a strongly auto-biographical aspect into Septimus's character. Ultimately, though, the novel serves as commentary on a wide array of issues, from colonialism (in Peter Walsh), commercialism, and medicine to feminism, bisexuality (Sally Seton), and politics. Feminism comprises a number of social, cultural and political movements, theories and moral philosophies that are concerned with cultural, political and economic practices and inequalities that discriminate against women. ... A poem by Coventry Patmore, first published in 1854 and revised up until 1862. ... Manic depression, with its two principal sub-types, bipolar disorder and major depression, was first clinically described near the end of the 19th century by psychiatrist Emil Kraepelin, who published his account of the disease in his Textbook of Psychiatry. ...

Adopting the plot device used by James Joyce in Ulysses, the narrative present of Mrs Dalloway is patterned as the sequence of a single day in June. The novel opens conventionally enough with the sentence, 'Mrs Dalloway said she would buy the flowers herself' (3). This is the exterior event, to borrow Eric Auerbach's terminology in his famous essay on Woolf, 'The Brown Stocking' (first published in 1946) which presents her as a modernist writer, par excellence, in that it that mobilises the story to follow. What follows, however, is a plunge into Clarissa Dalloway's past and into her memories of the open air at Bourton where she spent her adolescence long before she became Mrs Dalloway. Her recollection of that time leads her to think of Peter Walsh as he was then: she recalls his words 'Musing among the vegetables?', or something like that, she can't be exact. But she also thinks of him in the present: 'He would be back from India one of these days, June or July, she forgot which' (2-3). A paragraph later, she is back on the kerb, waiting for Durtnall's van to pass so that she can cross the road to go and buy the flowers. It is already apparent from these opening paragraphs that the past is intimately involved with the present. The past is not just background to the present, it becomes a part of it by virtue of Clarissa's association of the freshness of the June morning with Bourton and Peter. The fluidity of movement between past and present, which softens and blurs the lines of their traditional opposition, is emphasised by the equal vagueness of Clarissa's recall of Peters's words spoken at Bourton: 'Musing among the vegetables?'--was that it?--I prefer men to cauliflowers'--was that it?' and her indecision over the month of his return from India, 'June or July, she forgot which'.

Film adaptation

A film version of Mrs Dalloway was made in 1997 by Dutch feminist film director Marleen Gorris. It was adapted from Woolf's novel by British actress Eileen Atkins and starred Vanessa Redgrave in the title role. The cast included Natascha McElhone, Rupert Graves, Michael Kitchen, Alan Cox, and Sarah Badel. This is a list of film-related events in 1997. ... Feminism comprises a number of social, cultural and political movements, theories and moral philosophies that are concerned with cultural, political and economic practices and inequalities that discriminate against women. ... Writer-director from the Netherlands. ... Dame Eileen June Atkins, DBE (born June 16, 1934 in London, England) is a British writer and an award-winning film and theatre actress. ... Vanessa Redgrave, CBE (born 30 January 1937) is an Academy Award winning English actress and member of the Redgrave family, one of the enduring theatrical dynasties. ... Natascha McElhone (born Natascha Taylor, December 14, 1971 in Hampstead, London, England) is a British television and movie actress. ... Rupert Graves (born 30 June 1963) is an English actor. ... Michael Kitchen (born October 31, 1948 in Leicester) is an English actor. ... Alan Cox (born January 1, 1970) is a British actor, the son of the Emmy Award winning actor Brian Cox. ...

External links

• Project Gutenberg Australia hosts a free eBook of Mrs. Dalloway; note that copyright may apply in countries other than Australia - Zip file, Text file, HTML file
• Mrs. Dalloway at the Internet Movie Database
• Analysis of Characters in Mrs Dalloway: http://www.sparknotes.com/lit/dalloway/canalysis.html

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Virginia Woolf