Richard is yellow. Source: http://hubcap.clemson.edu/~sparks/TVSeminar/dallwalkmap.html
In this final reading assignment, Clarissa Dalloway leaves her party behind by going into an unoccupied room in order to take in the information that a young World War veteran being treated by Dr. Bradshaw has killed himself by throwing himself out a window. Meanwhile, Peter and Sally (now Lady Rosseter, by marriage) are talking together and waiting for Clarissa, who has asked them to wait until others have left so they can talk. Sally and Peter go over together what they think of certain others (Peter saying funny, sharp things), go over their past times at Bourton, and allude to what has happened to each in the intervening years. They watch Elizabeth crosses the room to be with her father. Clarissa comes out of the unoccupied room to talk to them, and the book ends.
Possible prompts:
--characterize Clarissa's inner response to hearing of Septimus' death.
--what quality does Sally have that has allowed her to be happy in a way that neither Clarissa nor Peter have been happy?
--what quality does Sally say that Clarissa has that has caused her a certain "lack"? Do you agree?
--briefly describe the very end of the book and then think about why the author might have chosen to end the book this way.
--note the design on the cover of the book, a reproduction of a Kandinsky painting, painted at about the same time Mrs. Dalloway was written. Why might somebody have thought it was a good idea to have this painting on the cover?
Remember, you are not required to respond to all of these. Just choose one, or if you really want to, do two.
Possible prompts:
--characterize Clarissa's inner response to hearing of Septimus' death.
--what quality does Sally have that has allowed her to be happy in a way that neither Clarissa nor Peter have been happy?
--what quality does Sally say that Clarissa has that has caused her a certain "lack"? Do you agree?
--briefly describe the very end of the book and then think about why the author might have chosen to end the book this way.
--note the design on the cover of the book, a reproduction of a Kandinsky painting, painted at about the same time Mrs. Dalloway was written. Why might somebody have thought it was a good idea to have this painting on the cover?
Remember, you are not required to respond to all of these. Just choose one, or if you really want to, do two.
25 comments:
I think that Sally has something that neither Richard or Clarissa has in that she stayed true to herself. All her life, she did only what made her happy, and nothing else. She married and had five sons because she wanted to, not because she felt she had to in order to live up to high status images. She also married for love, which we are not 100% sure Clarissa has done- as much as she loves Richard, we always see the tension of Peter being there.
In the very end of the book, Clarissa, not being able to really face Sally and being angered by the idea of death at her party, goes upstairs and watches the woman in the house across the way turn her light off and go to sleep. Clarissa relates to the death of Septimus, and decides that she is glad that he died. She then returns downstairs, and Peter once again thinks back to how incredible and breathtaking she is.
What this ending said to me (just addressing the part about Peter) is that maybe Clarissa liked the fantasy of being with Peter better than the actual reality. Or maybe she loved him as much as he loved (and still loves) her. It's difficult to say, but it was hard for me, as a reader, to see Peter so torn up about Clarissa and knowing that there's nothing that can be done. The ending to me felt a bit like there was a loose end in their relationship.
Somebody thought that this painting was a good cover for the book because it gives a great representation of the different emotions and streams of consciousness of Mrs. Dalloway. All her conflicting thoughts represented by the overlapping circles. The huge red dot on the side represents her love for Peter Walsh. Her vivid personality and love of life is seen in this image from the colors and shapes. It shows how one thought goes to another and how that thought brings about two other thoughts that are all randomly connected just like Mrs. Dalloway’s stream of consciousness. The picture with its interactions between the shapes and colors seem unrestricted and free, with all the shapes seeming to flow into each other making the whole image seem natural.
A second idea is that the image might have been chosen because it represents the interaction and how all the characters are connected. The two biggest shapes represents the two major characters that the book focuses on: Mrs. Dalloway and Septimus Smith. The big square in the middle could represent Mrs. Dalloway with the shapes on top of the square being everyone she knows such as Elizabeth, Peter, Richard, Sally, ECT… The big and red circle represents Septimus Smith with his wife close by being the red square.
I want to discuss why the author chose to end the book in this way. It seems to me that the reason for ending with the party scene, with the departure of the party guests, is to emphasize the theme of isolation. In their discussion, Sally Seton argues that you can never really know a person, even if you've lived with them your whole life. Peter disagrees, saying that people are easy to read, that he knows everyone. I think the theme of the book agrees more with Sally's hypothesis. Each of the party guests is like a floating island, mingling for a short while and then going back to their habitual routines. This book brings us so fully into the psychology of its characters -- we feel like we know Clarissa fully, like we know Septimus. However we cannot know them at all. Sally describes Clarissa as "a snob at heart," which Clarissa herself would most definitely disagree with. It is sad, I think the book connotes, that people do not make the effort to get to know each other fully. Even Sally and Peter do not know each other, they only know what their past experiences have taughte them. The saddest example of this isolation is, to me: "Even Ellie Henderson was going, nearly last of all, though no one had spoken to her, but she had wanted to see everything, to tell Edith." Clarissa completely overlooks Ellie Henderson. She is so completely wrapped up in her own psychological drama, in her own problems, that she discounts the fact that Ellie Henderson is a person deserving of attention, a person who loves and is loved. I feel that this book touches upon the sadness of the fact that we, as humans, do not look out for each other. That we are all emmensely complicated, and thus emmensely self-absorbed. The "party atmosphere" ending supports this idea -- the coming together of people who "know" each other, but can see the world through no other eyes but their own. I found the ending really sad, especially Peter's final reaction to Clarissa's entrance. It is the most vivid picture we have seen of his hopeless love for her. It is as he says: "One [cannot] be in love twice."
I think that Clarissa has a huge realization at the end of the book. When she is alone in the room, she comes clean with her feelings about Septimus' death along with her own disgraces. She leaves the room a different person than who she entered as. I think the end of the book contrasts Peter still holding on the past and regretting never being with her, and with Clarissa finally becoming okay with who she is. it is a huge step for her to take but i think she is beginning to disregard any fears or worries about age of youth. i also think it's important to notice that the end of the book ends with Peter's perspective. this could or could not be significant, but i know for me, it was a strong tone to end with.
I would like to discuss the cover artwork...
I think that the artwork on the cover is a good idea because it says a lot about society. The goldish box like figure in the center is scrambled and drizzled about with different shapes. The large pink circle, the different colors, the square, all of them could represent how people even though are pushed into a box to conform, they do not. And some people, like the shapes in the small black square conform even closer. The gold square/diamond could be England, and the black box the high society that Clarissa ran in. I think that the design says a lot about classism and how there can be exceptions at all times.
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Clarissa’s reaction to Septimus’s death is both typical and not of her usual reactions. We see her typical physical response to the news of Septimus’ death, “Always her body went through it first…her dress flamed, her body burned.” This shows one of Clarissa’s usual physical responses to something that is emotionally overwhelming. However, at the end of page 180, we see Clarissa thinking about how life may be intolerable “one’s parents giving it into one’s hands, this life, to be lived to the end…there was in the depths of her heart an awful fear.” Clarissa has never feared life before. She always saw the pretty flowers of the horse’s hooves and loved life, but now hearing about Septimus committing suicide she is afraid. On page 182, Clarissa is back to loving life and she things of the clock’s tolling as leaden circles again and she feels the beauty in life. She then returns to her duties as hostess and thinks back to the party going on around her.
Like how the cover art is abstract, so is the mind. Mrs. Dalloway was really about the inner workings of the mind and people, and I think really any abstract piece of art would work for the cover, but this one is particularly nice because of all those contrasting colors, but people already discussed all that.
I personally really liked the way the book ended. I loved how Peter got really excited to see Clarissa again. He thinks about his loves and his complications so much but the ending was just so simple. So much thinking, so much complication, so much mind working and then plain emotions.
I also agree with Audrey, Clarissa does seem to come to accept herself at the end through thinking about the death of another.
I kind of agree with Julie's take on Sally. Sally was never at all concerned about her public reputation, and she largely focused on doing things because she wanted to, not because others wanted her to. She was in love with the person she married and she loves her family dearly. It never explicitly states (at least I never came across it) that Mrs. Dalloway really loves Richard or her daughter for that matter.
Peter states that it is easy to read people, but I think another way in which Sally was free was when she said that you can never truly know everything about a person. Thinking that you know everything about someone gives someone a sense of power, but I think that ultimately something that Sally was lacking was the need for such a sense of power in her life. She did things because she wanted to, and because they made her happy, not because she was interested in getting anything else out of them.
Checking in....I think that Rosie brings up an interesting point in what she said in the end of her comment. I took it to mean that maybe although Sally seemed to be so happy with her carefree life, Clarissa was actually just as happy because she had a purpose and was driven by the society around her. I think this is interesting because we have usually looked on the societal pull on Clarissa as such a negative, constricting part of her life. We have discussed how societal ideals keep Clarissa’s thoughts of nature around her and her true feelings for Sally locked up inside her head. I think that Rosie’s interpretation is an interesting new way of looking at this.
The cover of the book is a good representation of Clarissa Dalloway and the high society that she lives in.
The piece of art is rather abstract, in that you can't really tell what exactly it is besides a bunch of circles and squares. It is appropriate because Clarissa's life is shallow, filled with materialism and wealth and parties, similar to this painting; what you see in the painting is what is actually in the painting. The way in which the circles and squares are placed in the painting are rather random, which represents the ambiguity of Clarissa's position in life - the near yet far distance between Peter and herself, her response to Septimus' death - it seems all jumbled up, like the painting.
Clarissa's thoughts about Septimus' death are that she is glad he killed himself. She is glad he took himself out of a place he was unhappy. I think this relates back to herself because she escapes from the party for a little while and begins to think about his death. She leaves to get away from reality, her past and the commotion and when she thinks about how it was a good choice i think she is overwhelmed by her own intense thoughts always surrounding her and she realizes that it would be easier to just escape by death. Yet she also says that his death helped her feel the beauty and the fun. Maybe his death also makes her see how much she is living for and how far away from death she is. I think she begins to see the full circle in life that she is just at one point and that it will end but shes still living now and its fun if you let it be and it is beautiful to watch.
checking in, everyone's comments bring up some very good points about clarissa having a change of view
While i agree that the cover artwork could be a representation of society i think it is also connected with the ideas behind insanity, observation and awareness. The way Mrs. Dalloway is written, the reader sees into the minds of the characters and the way they see things. We see their collaborations and thoughts and how different ideas overlap and conflict. The artwork on the cover reminds me of an abstract portrayal of a galaxy, with stars clumping together sending light and energy towards eachother the way they do in science movies. I can just imagine that if the artwork was in motion the circles that are clumping together would all soon collide and cause some sort of explosion. Definitely similar to insanity in that sense then. Eventually all the thoughts of an insane person such as Septimus collide. He killed himself out of an instinctual reaction to the many thoughts in his head suddenly coming all at once as Dr. Holmes comes to pay a visit.
I'd like to comment on/add to Julie and CJ's posts. Along with CJ's ideas, I definitely agree that the ending still has a looseness of Peter and Clarissa's relationship and is almost like there is no sense of closure. My main point I'd like to make raises a question; What is the significance of her looking out her bedroom window at a woman getting ready for bed?" Could it be that it has to do with her possilby being a lesbian. That question was never truly answered throughout the book and also the ending has no new or better connection in her relationship with Peter. I'm just wondering about it and thought I would bring the idea up. Very intriguing way to the end the book.
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Clarissa's inner response to hearing of Septimus' death:
We have talked a lot in class about the similarities between Clarissa and Septimus, and the similarities between how their brains work. Clarissa, though she has never met Septimus and knows little of him, sees much of herself in him, a man who threw himself out of his window. Clarissa is so aware of life. She wants to be connected; she wants to feel. She has faults and is, in some ways, a petty "snob," as Sally calls her. But she has depth and is aware of the world and the universe, and of taking her place in the universe (whatever that is--she figures it out every day). Still, though, this feeling, this awareness of life is intense, and Clarissa is scared--as she says, she feels "terror; the overwhelming incapacity, one's parents giving it into one's hands, this life, to be lived to the end, to be walked with serenely...quite often if Richard had not been there reading the Times...she must have perished." Life being felt so intensely is not an easy thing, with the pressure of time always at one's back. Clarissa is familiar with the feeling she assumes Septimus had of terror, of fear of beloved life. She is aware of all that she gives up, aware of her faults, and is proud that Septimus did not give anything up, made his death an act of defiance. Clarissa, rather than feel fully and insist on connection all the time, gives in to "corruption, lies, chatter." Septimus holds on to feeling and insists, even in death, on connection: he does not let the doctors separate him from Rezia; it would not be right. This "thing that matter[s]," this giving into life, this feeling, Clarissa yearns for every single day, yet feels "closeness [draw] apart." She admires Septimus for refusing to let the closeness draw apart for him, for preferring the "embrace in death" to that.
Septimus' suicide does pain Clarissa, especially at first. She says it is "her punishment to see sink and disappear here a man, there a woman, in this profound darkness, and she forced to stand here in her evening dress." She has to see people leave life, see it overwhelm them, while she stands there in her evening dress--in her self-chosen confines, jealous, on some level, of the way life overwhelms and consumes those men and women fully.
She does not pity Septimus, she says; she is glad he had "thrown it all away." She can see the dignity in leaving the intensity of life, of time, of the "leaden circles dissolv[ing] in the air." She sees the dignity of it, yet is also glad that it makes her remember why she has chosen not to throw it all away. It reminds Clarissa that she has chosen to get to experience the beauty and the fun, to see the horse's hoofs and "tapering vast clouds" and feel life. Both Septimus and she are part of and experience that "divine vitality which Clarissa loved."
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Upon finishing the book I was inspired to write a little Haiku of my overall sense of the novel (plus a few artistic differences).
Then conformity
Now society is masked
Woolf breaks us all free
So yeah I took some artistic liberties so sue me (well don't but...yeah), but still I feel like a big theme of Mrs. Dalloway not to mention Woolf's writing. The theme i'm talking about revolves around society and the pressure to conform and to be someone that someone else wants/expects you to be instead of who you really are.
Even until the end of the book we see this struggle to conform remains a forethought. Clarissa who thought early on in the novel that perhaps she does not deserve to be happy because in her third eye of society she has accomplished nothing finally recognizes that being happy is really all that matters.
Really quickly I'd like to comment on the artwork on the cover of Mrs. Dalloway. At first, I was surprised to find out that this artwork was not 'new' or modern but that it had been created around the time that Mrs. Dalloway was published. I think that that first off says something important about the connection story itself.
When this book was first published in 1925 the move to modernism and abstractism (is that even a word??) in painting had not completely left the ground yet. Now this is not to say that these types of works did not exist but it is true that they were certainly knew, which I believe is similar to Mrs. Dalloway.
Disregarding her age (which is around mid 50's), Clarissa is in many ways new. She is new in the fact that she disregards society, not completely, but enough that she can live a happy life (in many of the same ways that Virginia Woolf herself did).
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checking in... very intersting blog
I agree with everyone about the cover art, didn't think much about while reading the book, but now I see it.
I think it was the only way that the book could have ended.
No matter how much any of these characters tried to grow up and move on or try to become more matture people- the ending shows that they're all still so stuck in the past. So much so that Clarissa was even happy for Septimus for killing himself. I think in a way, Ms.Woolf tried to produce an image of hope. That maybe, if they could all have had the chance of just throwing it all away, they would have. I think in the end, with such internal thoughts and clear actions, like Peter's amazement when Clarissa steps out of the room, really allows us to see how much they didn't do in their past that they're still trying to do now.
Wouldn't we all like to just throw everything away like Septimus did, at least at some point in our lives?
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