Analysis Of The Novel ' Mrs. Dalloway ' Essay

Harper Lee’s To Kill a Mockingbird demonstrates organic unity through the use of literary tools to create, maintain, and amplify the central theme. Lee constructs and develops the theme of social inequality by employing dialogue, irony, and an extended metaphor. Through dialogue, the townspeople show contempt for blacks, viewing them and anyone who treats them as equals as inferior. This is evident in the analysis of the conversations of Bob Ewell, Mrs. Dubose, and Francis Hancock where they refer to black people as uncivilized savages. Not only does Bob Ewell, contribute to the theme through his dialogue, but his full name of Robert E. Lee Ewell provokes irony that clarifies the racist undertones of the novel. Moreover, irony functions

In Mrs. Dalloway Clarissa and Septimus smith have various similarities. Clarissa eventually triumphs over her issues/depression in her life unlike Septimus that eventually loses and commits suicide. Mrs. Dalloway an upper class 50 year old British wife the central character of the novel, struggles constantly to balance her thoughts and world. Her world consists of a fabulous lifestyle such as fine fashion, parties, and aristocratic society, but as she the novel goes on she looks beneath the glamour of her life and searches for a deeper meaning. Looking for privacy, Clarissa has a tendency toward introspection that gives her a capacity for emotion. She is always concerned with appearances around other people and no matter the pressure she keeps herself composed. She uses a lot of useless talking and activity to keep her ideas and emotions safe and locked away, which can make her seem shallow even to those who know her well.

The 1920s exist in the popular imagination as a time of freedom and wild energy, a time where social mores were discarded and independance embraced. This perception hardly fits with the reality. As with most eras the 1920s had a multitude of conventions and taboos. As with most eras, those who broke with such things were frowned upon. While parts of society were changing, conformity was still very much valued, as explored in Virginia Woolf’s Mrs. Dalloway. Through the character of Clarissa Dalloway and her parallel found in Septimus Smith, Woolf portrays oppressive conformity and the inner self it hides, especially as related to queerness and compulsory heterosexuality; all this serves to illuminate the themes of conventionality and conversion

Chapter nine of Harper Lee’s ‘To Kill a Mockingbird’ begins with Scout fighting a classmate named Cecil Jacobs. It starts when Scout reflects what happens that day at school when she fought Cecil Jacobs at school and her cousin Francis later on. We also learn more information about the family of Atticus and his relatives. Lee’s style of writing is extremely coherent and uses imagery and figurative language in her writing. She uses these writing techniques to demonstrate human action and story development throughout ‘To Kill a Mockingbird’. She also uses metaphors as a literary device. Using these writing techniques, she gives the story a unique perspective as the plot develops.

On March 4, 1933, Franklin D. Roosevelt stated in his first inauguration speech, “So, first of all, let me assert my firm belief that the only thing we have to fear is fear itself, nameless, unreasoning, unjustified terror which paralyzes needed efforts to convert retreat into advance," (Baughman). This quote translates to a confusing concept at first, but once discussed is practical: the fear of an individual should not be the concern, yet it should be the damage fear itself has on one. Little did we know at the time that this quote, "the only thing we have to fear is fear itself” would turn into “the very symbol” of Roosevelt’s Presidency (Baughman).

The only distraction Clarissa has from her internal suffering is her party’s, where she tries to convey to society that she is doing well. Possibly, Virginia Woolf felt that if she herself were social, her problems would have been solved. Although at Clarissa’s parties, she seem disconnected and unable to hold a conversation with her guests, this is evident when she slips away at her party “But where is Clarissa?” said Peter. He was sitting on the sofa with Sally. “Where’s the women gone to?”

Women and Expectations in the 1920s Virginia Woolf expresses a lot of different aspects of characters in Mrs. Dalloway, and one of them is the relation of the characteristics of Clarissa Dalloway and women in the 1920s in general. In this story, Clarissa Dalloway is a character who most likely to be expressed as mellow and miserable. She is miserable and sad because she is most likely stuck in her previous life, regarding her previous relationship and memories with somebody. She has been thinking about it every single day and she cannot get rid of it. Her unhappiness is caused by her lack of activities and social life, and she was encouraged to choose quick decision by her mindset at that time period.

In the novel Mrs Dalloway, Woolf conveys her perspective, as she finely examines and critiques the traditional gender roles of women in a changing post-war society. Woolf characterisation of Clarissa Dalloway in a non linear structure, presents a critical portrayal of the existing class structure through modernist’s eyes. Titling her novel as Mrs Dalloway presents Clarissa’s marriage as a central focus of her life, drawing attention to how a women’s identity is defined by marriage. Despite the changing role of women throughout the 1920s, for married women life was the same post war. Clarissa experiences ‘the oddest sense of being herself invisible…that is being Mrs Dalloway…this being Richard Dalloway,”

In Virginia Woolf’s Mrs. Dalloway, Clarissa Dalloway and Septimus Warren Smith are perceived as completely different people, but as one looks deeper, their characters become hard to differentiate from one another. While Septimus is a young, male, middle class veteran suffering from post traumatic stress disorder, Clarissa is an older woman in the upper class who enjoys throwing parties. However, as the day continues one can see these two characters share more in common than previously determined. All in all, Clarissa and Septimus are an unlikely pair of characters to relate to each other, but the two are more alike than different.

From the beginning of Mrs. Dalloway, Woolf establishes that Clarissa’s bright and hopeful spirit has become dulled and burdened when subjected to the oppressive nature of marriage. During a glimpse into her younger years, the reader is able to see Clarissa. With each flashback into Clarissa’s youth, the reader is provided another image of Clarissa before marriage, one that highlights her passion and curiosity for life. While Clarissa felt a passion and connection with Peter, she could not bear to live in a marriage where her freedom was something she had to sacrifice. The decision she makes is logical in some ways, but her choice also brings into question the fault of her marriage in the first place. In Clarissa’s world, the option for passion and the security of her freedom was not available nor would it ever be; therefore, she was forced to choose between the two. Men, however, were not forced to make such decisions and were given the liberty to wait well into their later years to find a spouse suitable to their liking. By choosing to marry Richard over Peter, Clarissa forsook the option of passion in

  Clarissa Dalloway, the central character in Virginia Woolf's Mrs. Dalloway, is a complex figure whose relations with other women reveal as much about her personality as do her own musings. By focusing at length on several characters, all of whom are in some way connected to Clarissa, Woolf expertly portrays the ways females interact: sometimes drawing upon one another for things which they cannot get from men; other times, turning on each other out of jealousy and insecurity.

During the time of a young modern society, there were ideals and social standards that led people to feel isolated from their own expressions and thoughts. In Mrs. Dalloway, identity is a significant theme depicted in the novel and is prevalent between the characters portrayed throughout. One character in particular that represents the image and reflection of identity in the British society during the first world war is Clarissa Dalloway. All the attributes such as her love for flowers, her lavish entertaining parties, and the bonds she has between her friends and lovers reveal something about her identity that she discovers about herself at the end of the book. Clarissa’s personality is complex and moving as her emotions and life events are unraveled in the moment as things happen.

Post World War I London society was characterized by a flow of new luxuries available to the wealthy and unemployment throughout the lower classes. Fascinated by the rapidly growing hierarchal social class system, Virginia Woolf, a young writer living in London at the time, sought to criticize it and reveal the corruption which lay beneath its surface. Mrs. Dalloway, Woolf’s fourth novel, was born in 1925 out of this desire precisely. A recurring focus in many of Woolf’s major novels is the individual and his or her conscious perceptions of daily life. Throughout Mrs. Dalloway, Woolf uses this technique, known as a “stream-of-consciousness,” to trace the thoughts of Clarissa Dalloway and Septimus Warren Smith during one day in London five years after the Great War. It is exactly this narrative technique which allows Woolf to compare the lives of these two characters which belong to different social classes to argue that social placement has a negative effect on one’s life and psychological being.

In the book Mrs. Dalloway, Virginia Woolf wanted to cast the social system and bash it for how it worked. Her intricate focus is focusing not on the people, but on the morals of a certain class at a certain historical moment.

"Mrs. Dalloway" written by Virginia Woolf is about the fictional life of a character by the name of Clarrisa Dalloway, who is seen to be this high class woman living in an era after the war, who is preparing for a party that she is to be hosting later on. Virginia Woolf seemed to use time as a main part of the setting of her story too by setting it in the morning and ending the next day at three in the morning. Using time like this is significant because then now the reader must really pay attention since every detail seems important. For example when characters reflect on past incidents that happened in their lives and then the story suddenly turns back into the present and in reality of the story a few minutes have only gone by. An example of that is when Clarrisa reflects her youth, "What a lark! What a plunge! For so it had always seemed to her, when, with a little squeak of the hinges,