Class notes
ENG210 LECTURE NOTES MRS DALLOWAY
- Course
- ENG210 (ENG210)
- Institution
- University Of Pretoria (UP)
IN DEPTH GUIDE TO UNDERSTANDING ENG210 LITERATURE
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English 210Mrs Dalloway
Lecture 1:
Virginia Woolf:
- 1882-1941
- Suffered from bipolar disorder
- After her father died she attempted to commit suicide
- Haunted by thoughts of death
- At age of 59 she drowned herself in river
Modernism:
- Modernist felt alienation to Victorian morality & convention
- New ides in psychology, philosophy, political theory kindled search for new modes of
expression
- Response to changed world (rapid urbanization, industrialization, social change)
Feminism:
- Woolf believed that inner realities of women were not explored
- Woolf advocates for gender equality through character of Mrs Dalloway who is restricted by her
gender
Lecture 2:
- Woolf’s stream of consciousness (free indirect discourse: technique as an attempt at
psychological realism
- Clarissa is haunted by past even as she delights present: rational movement of time contrasted
with repetitive preoccupation with returning to past
- Density of text @ opening of novel: signifies influx of memories passing into Clarissa’s mind
- Experience richness of moment in London, which is simultaneously paired with flow of
Clarissa’s mind
THIS IS INTELLECTUAL PROPERTY OF JENNA ROSE LOPES- DO NOT ILLEGALLY DISTRIBUTE.
(SUMMARIES MADE USING ENG 210 LECTURES FROM THE UNIVERSITY OF PRETORIA: INTELLECTUAL
CREDIT IS DUE TO THE LECTURERS OF THIS MODULE.)
, - Stream of consciousness is an attempt to capture mind as it receives stimuli, as it reacts to an
internal & external dimension
- Clarissa’s character is contrasted with that of Septimus’s
- Omniscient 3rd person narrator: narrator is able to travel into minds of characters, has access to
all minds of characters, slides into consciousness of character 1 @ time
- Chronological movement of Big Ben vs fluid conception of time (linearity is denied by returning
to past)
- Woolf’s language is suggestive of ongoing mental processes & flux of experience: use of long
& complicated sentences, additional information is supplied in information
- This style mimics consciousness perceiving, responding, interacting
- Present participles: evoke intensity of what Clarissa experiences
- Complexity in Clarissa’s nature: privileged, colonial, & also has sympathetic capacity, aware of
complexities of others, wary of her own tendency to criticize
- Clarissa’s refusal to comment on whether people are this or that: echoes Woolf’s concern with
mystery of personhood, private realities
- Exploration of gap between what world expects us to be & who we know ourselves to be
- Woolf’s psychological portraiture highlights Clarissa’s realities as aging woman
- Backfiring car is linking device that moves from Clarissa to Septimus Warren Smith & triggers
series of perspectival shifts by accessing minds of several everyday Londoners
- Clarissa views London as delightfully mad metropolis, Septimus views London as nightmarish,
sinister hellscape
- Patriotic zeal on display: effect of sight of car on crowd, sense of wonder & awe, equated to
religious feeling
- Woolf displays seductive power of authority: Septimus has been shaped & broken by society;
Prime Minister attends Clarissa’s party which delights her as it associates her with authority,
power
“Fear no more the heat o’ the sun nor the furious winter’s rages” = quote that Clarissa sees in shop
window
- Intensities of life are no longer threatening: implies comfort
- For Clarissa it implies withering of passion that accompanies age, this is why she returns to
past memoires in her mind
- Heat of sun = stands for sexuality, kind of feminine blossoming (ends in furious winter of old
age)
Lecture 3:
- Sky-writing aeroplane was spectacular event @ time
- Shift in power is suggested by way sky-writing aeroplane (emblem of modernity), steals
attention from car that possibly contains Prime Minister
THIS IS INTELLECTUAL PROPERTY OF JENNA ROSE LOPES- DO NOT ILLEGALLY DISTRIBUTE.
(SUMMARIES MADE USING ENG 210 LECTURES FROM THE UNIVERSITY OF PRETORIA: INTELLECTUAL
CREDIT IS DUE TO THE LECTURERS OF THIS MODULE.)
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