Death in Mrs. Dalloway

She feels she has done an inadequate job as a wife and as an author: she wishes fruitlessly that she might live up to society's expectations of being a mother who is not afflicted with illness and a much-celebrated novelist. However, in the day of her life that Cunningham recounts over the course of the novel, she does not fully accept death as the way to end her suffering, because she still bears a sense of optimism about her own capabilities. Initially, she convinces herself that the ordinary housewife, Clarissa, in her novel Mrs. Dalloway will commit suicide to flee her sorrows over being unable to accomplish some extraordinary or applauded feat. Yet, a glimpse at death in nature acts to change her view: ". . . the bird is laid on the grass compactly, its wings folded up against its body. She knows it has died already, in Quentin's palms. It seems to have wanted to make the smallest possibly package of itself" (120). In death, the bird bears less significance, and life perdures all around it in the form of Vanessa's children. Virginia relates herself to the bird, and realizes that she is not yet ready to be so insignificant. She has great hope in the potential for her novel, eagerly anticipating that in its writing, she can integrate herself to a degree back into the life of the thriving society of London. Thus, she chooses to use Clarissa Dalloway to represent the life she aspires to have, and chooses that

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.

Analyzing her newfound appreciation sanctions Woolf to remind herself that life is precious. Reminding herself of life 's grandeur enables Woolf to then transfer the tone into her writing. Conveying the value of life, changes Woolf’s perspective. She values life more, but as she has learned earlier from the moth, sadness is inherent; sadness is brought by tragedy, like dying. Conclusively, Woolf’s use of pathos in her writing enabled her to present a clear tone, which contributed to the theme that death is inevitable.

‘Mrs. Dalloway’, by Virginia Woolf is a derivative text of ‘The Hours’, written by Michael Cunningham. The novels both share an important theme of mental health. The circumstances of mental health are commonly sympathetic, and empathetic. The characters Septimus and Clarissa in ‘Mrs. Dalloway’ and Richard, Laura Brown, and Virginia Woolf in ‘The Hours’ show the strongest symbols for this theme. Most of the problems and treatments these characters face are in direct result of the age they live in. Both novels express a relationship between era, illnesses and treatments.

Throughout her life, novelist Virginia Woolf suffered with mental illness, and she ultimately ended her life at age 59. As art often imitates life, it is not surprising that characters in Woolf’s works also struggle with mental illness. One of her novels, Mrs. Dalloway, recounts a day in the life of Clarissa Dalloway, a high society woman living in London, and those who run in her circle. As the novel progresses the reader sees one of the characters, Septimus, struggle with post-traumatic stress disorder brought on by serving in war. At the end of the story, he commits suicide. While there is no explicit articulation of any other character suffering from mental illness in the novel, Septimus is not alone. Through her thoughts and actions, we can deduce that Clarissa also endures mental and emotional suffering. Though Clarissa does not actually attempt to end her life in the novel, her mental and emotional suffering lead her to exhibit suicidal tendencies. To prove this, I will examine Clarissa’s thoughts and actions from a psychological perspective.

Another small but important window scene takes place after Clarissa returns home to discover that her husband has been invited to Millicent Bruton’s lunch party but she has not. After reading the message about the party on a notepad, she begins to retreat upstairs to her private room, “a single figure against the appalling night.” As she lingers before the “open staircase window,” she feels her own aging, “suddenly shriveled, aged, breastless… out of doors, out of the window, out of her body and brain which now failed…” Again, there is a hint of danger as death is portrayed as a somewhat alluring transcendental experience,

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,”

Rather than just offering the empathy, she understands, what Septimus's final act means, the death is a kind of availably form of the powerful self – expression, which makes Septimus “plunged holding his treasure” (Woolf 184). The internal peace that he aims for, and also allows Clarissa realizes how meaningless that her material life has been. While you die, none material objects you can carry on; however, the spirit/ mind can be the thing that carries forever. She recognizes Septimus’s death not as the escape of life, but blooming of the flower of self – consciousness. Although she still seemingly surrenders in the end of the novel to get back the party, Woolf speaks through Peter’s words, “It is Clarissa, he said. For there she was.”

Clarissa and Septimus both feel trapped in their lives and oppressed by the people around them, which leads to them find ways in which they can escape the negative world around them. Clarissa is described to the reader as having “a perpetual sense, as she watched the taxi cabs, of being out, out, far out to sea and alone; she always had the feeling that it was very dangerous to live even one day” (Woolf, 17). Even as Clarissa walks down a crowded street the sense of loneliness controls her mind. Societal oppression of loneliness makes her feel distant from the rest of society. She describes herself as, “no longer being Clarissa, but simply Mrs. Dalloway” (Woolf, 11). Clarissa has lost a sense of herself and feels as though she no longer fits in. However, her parties serve as an escape from the outside world, which helps to explain why she loves

taxi cabs, of being out, out, far to sea and alone; she always had the

Virginia Woolf is a married woman who had public affairs with women and who shares a chaste kiss with her sister during her narrative. Woolf is also the author of Mrs. Dalloway, a novel that centers on Clarissa Dalloway, a woman who feels the same way "as men feel" (Woolf 36) about women, yet marries a man as society dictates.

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

The effect of Sally on Clarissa's life runs deep, as she is a close friend as well as a physical attraction. In fact, in

Throughout the novel, there are flashbacks of Clarissa spending her summer at Bourton and her living in the present of wartime Britain. This is significant because most of the time Clarissa reflects on the past and she connects it to her current life while all of these events are happening in a single day. In the beginning of the novel Clarissa buy flowers for the party she is hosting later on in the evening, the flowers being symbolic in the novel representing her love and joy for them. “How fresh, how calm, stiller than this of course, the air was in the early morning; like the flap of a wave; chill and sharp and yet (for a girl of eighteen as she then was) solemn, feeling as she did,

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.