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Woolf + Modernism (ENGL 221)
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- ENGL 221
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- University Of British Columbia (UBC )
Woolf + Modernism (ENGL 221)
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On Modernism & an Introduction to Virginia WoolfRequired readings: “Mrs. Dalloway” by Virginia Woolf
March 28th, 2022 - March 30th, 2022
Using “Free-Indirect Discourse” vs “Stream of Consciousness”
Jane Austen Virginia Woolf
Invented the use of “free-indirect discourse” Goes beyond “free-indirect discourse” by
that combined the thoughts of the character never allowing the reader to get out of it in the
and the narrator, and only goes into form of “streams of consciousness.” She
Elizabeth’s thoughts (no other thoughts). jumps from one character’s thoughts to
another character’s thoughts very fluidly.
One character combined with the narrator Multiple characters with overlapping streams
through free-indirect discourse. of consciousness.
Doesn’t draw as much attention to detail. Modernists were very aesthetically-minded.
● Woolf didn’t intend for her work to be
aestheticized.
Uses speech. Doesn’t prefer speech. Speech is within the
thoughts (e.g., Clarissa wanting to flirt with
Peter but not really)
● Will just drop a few lines of poetry.
Tells a story. “Authorly writing.” Wants you to examine the
light as it falls on everything, rather than to
provide a plot. Allow you to see more than
what you can usually see.
● See things more deeply and clearly.
● Not “asleep at the wheel”
Some things cannot be said in fiction. Nothing is off-limits. Fiction is for talking
about anything and everything.
● People are moving within other peoples’ orbits. Woolf is moving into the thoughts of
others. Focus on: Clarissa, Septimus, Peter
● Always think back to WWI context
● Read as poetry rather than prose – modernists saw prose as “lies”
Characters & Ideas to Focus On
, Clarissa 1918, recovering from the Spanish Flu and menopausal. Something
is nagging on her—her husband put her in the attic to “recover
better,” and feels desexed. She is ruminating a lot on aging as her
husband finds her less desirable. Struggle with age and anxiety
about death.
● Going about her day, feeling quite well, but then comes the
thought of her husband sending her up to the attic.
● Watches her daughter hanging out with a religious woman,
which bothers her a bit.
● Thinks a lot about when she was 18, about when everybody
and PETER loved her (her husband has difficulty
expressing his love for her verbally). Clarissa needs
something to come into her life, which are often the
memories that involve Peter.
● Sally Seton – best kiss of Clarissa’s life. Most of the
Bloomsbury group were fine with going “other ways.” She
has this moment which is positively transporting, and
remembers that because she remembers that she could feel
that intensely. She keeps craving that feeling.
● Presented as an observer of her own life (by Woolf)
Peter Coming back from India, his marriage failed, met a new woman
and has a couple kids, and needs to divorce in order to marry again
(this makes Clarissa squeamish – she thinks it isn’t classy).
● Wanted to marry Clarissa in their youth, got rejected.
● Comes and goes, goes uptown following a woman (that he
thinks is hot) and is “fingering a pen knife” (provocative)
● A sort of a bridge in the story, “mediator”
Septimus
Rezia (to a lesser degree)
The Bang on Bond St. An instance in the novel that underlines a main theme of the novel:
World War I. People in this novel were traumatized from WWI
and react in shock because of this trauma.
● Doctors in the novel are super dismissive of PTSD, and tell
Septimus to rest (which is the last thing he needs. He can’t
be left alone with his thoughts.)
● Virginia Woolf knows about this mental illness (and almost
killed herself from this same prescription) and almost seems
to criticize these doctors through her fiction.
On Virginia Woolf
● November 8th, 1910
● First post-impressionist exhibit in England (her friend, Roger Fry)
, ● Gaugin, Van Gogh, Matisse, Cezanne, Seurat, Manet
Series of Crises
Crisis of faith in God and in Reason
● Society is becoming more secular (excluding religion from government, education, etc.)
● Theory of Relativity by Albert Einstein is first published
○ Relativity means that you no longer have the entire enclosure of an idea
○ It is relative to the context that it is in
○ This is anxiety-inducing for a society that follows a religious practice
● World War I – great war, war to end all wars, trenches, sense of social, spiritual paralysis
● WWII Holocaust, nuclear bombs used on Hiroshima + Nagasaki (1945)
○ Are humans really the highest level of intelligence if you kill them like cattle?
○ Someone without a “divine right” systematically killing millions of people
■ How can we justify these actions? A world in crisis.
● Karl Marx, questioned human rationality in light of structural inequality
○ How can human beings be rational & equal with unequal distribution of wealth?
● Sigmund Freud (questioning conscious via the unconscious)
● Friedrich Nietzsche, the psychological drives, the “will to power” overrides all things
○ Thinking back to Jekyll and Hyde: there’s no morality to control the drives. We
have a will to power and a will to fulfill our desires.
Crisis of Representation
● Realism as a convention inadequate as our reality is internal as well as external
● Huge subject in literary study, hard to come to terms with what it actually means
○ Realism is a convention. It is no realer than what Woolf is doing (stream of
consciousness). Woolf is arguably more realistic.
Modern response to these crises of convention and understanding:
● The rehabilitative power of art.
● Conscious desire to overturn traditional modes of representation. Deliberate.
○ Traditional modes of representation got us to wars and murder.
○ Modernists thought art had the power to renew the world.
● Expression of new sensibilities.
○ At least for the Bloomsbury group, these new sensibilities allowed for no false
gods or no proscriptive rules. Everything can be made into art.
Tenets of Modernism
● Work of art is autonomous – important in and of itself, not because of its function.
● Rigorously experimental and formally innovative.
● High culture, not popular culture.
● Rejection of Realism and Romanticism, Victorian moral and domestic values.
● “The nightmare of history from which we are trying to awaken” – James Joyce
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