Mrs. Dalloway

(Please read about VW first, which is the first post on this series.) Mrs. Dalloway is a story of one woman in a single day of her life. The novel opens with the first sentence - "Mrs. Dalloway said she shall buy the flowers herself." - Shows, so much of brightness, so much of hope, so much of possibility. And then the lady walks past the Bond Street, London, and as she observes every thing that happens there, slowly the author shapes her character and her state of mind. 

As said earlier VW has used the Stream of conscious method, which actually depicts what ever goes on one's mind as and when thought. Our mind does not stick to one topic or thought, it keeps drifting from one to another, and the author collects them as it is. There is one situation in the book, where every one on the street are observing an aircraft fly, which leaves behind a lot of a smoke, that appears to people standing below as to form alphabets, may be a “M” a “A” or some thing else. Mrs. Dalloway waiting there, looking up at the sky wonders what the alphabets are trying to convey. Actually this shows the confusion in mind of the onlookers and their state of mind at that point. VW, creates a character similar to Dalloway, called Spetimus. Spetimus and Mrs. Dalloway are similar in their thoughts; both are going through same type of voidness in life – A sense of Narrowing of their existence.” Spetimus hates doctors who claim that he is insane. He struggles to pull himself out from memories of the war, friends he has lost over the battle and in this process has weird thoughts; suspicions bother him. I somehow think that VW somewhere tries to put her words through the mouth of Spetimus. He says, he hates human nature, he says he hates doctors; he says that they don’t speak for his interest. 

As VW never liked doctors speak for her, decide what her interests should be. I always feel that VW, created Septimus as an image of Dalloway, as an image of her ill thoughts, the death of who teaches Mrs. Dalloway to appreciate life. That’s the balance of life; someone’s death inspires others to value life more. Mrs. Dalloway is a story that allows one to appreciate life for what ever it is. I still enjoy reading the words in the climax. When Mrs. Dalloway observes an old lady in the opposite apartment, making bed for the night, she would sleep for another night and prepare herself for another day. This thought fills her with zeal for life. After all life is to live it as it comes and then put it away. Sleep and prepare ourselves for the next day. I have used this whole concept of Septimus and Mrs. Dalloway in one of my stories. Where the main character, a middle aged man struggles to cope up with his age, struggles to find a motive to live. And left with no choice but death, or that’s what he believes. I have completed the story by providing two endings – Septimus and Dalloway. Even though the decisions taken in both cases are different, the theme is same, the answer is same. VW, had first thought of naming this novel as “The Hours” before she changed it to “Mrs. Dalloway”.