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Did Virginia Woolf realize how much she was writing about herself throughout her career?It is almost impossible to say for certain.As readers, all we can do is sift through the pieces and conjecture.In Mrs. Dalloway, said by some critics to be her best work, the central characters show a remarkable resemblance to Woolf at times.Woolf uses the characters of Clarissa Dalloway and Septimus Warren Smith in a large way to describe the two sides of herself…the rational and the sane. While it might be too hasty to say that she intended these two characters to directly reflect her own personality it its different shades, we can certainly see where this happens, even if unintentionally.
Clarissa Dalloway is a pathetic and tragic figure.Pathetic because she distills the joy of life into simple social functions, and tragic because although she has explicit knowledge of the joy of living, social functions are the only method available to her with which to personalize this joy.She is trapped by society, in the ways that Woolf explores in her other works, by the role delegated to her by gender-norms of the time period.Luckily for Woolf, she was able to cross many of the gender boundaries that she observed around her with her writing she made a career other than wife/mother for herself, and gained individual recognition through her choice of career.Clarissa was not so lucky, and in this way highlights the problems of women that Woolf saw all around her, and the fate that Woolf narrowly escaped in her lifetime.In a way, this can be seen as a purging of Woolf's fears of housewifely mediocrity.
Clarissa's passion was not always expressed solely through her social functions.Before she married Richard Dalloway, she bore an intellectual likeness to Woolf.Clarissa debated with her friends, even the topic of women's rights was addressed as is remembered by Peter Walsh on page 7, held a strong affinity for walking through gardens, and liked to read serious literature, "her favourite reading as a girl was Huxley and Tyndall." (Woolf 77)While it is evident that Woolf was not a fan of "English society," and pokes fun at it in Mrs. Dalloway, especially through the use of the character Hugh Whitbread, Woolf was not completely immune from it herself.
Clarissa's sexuality can be linked to Woolf's.The image presented of Clarissa's sexual relationship with Richard is that of "the bed narrow…a virginity preserved through childbirth which clung to her like a sheet." (Woolf 1)This sexual rigidity was also apparent between Virginia and Leonard Woolf, as is documented from Virginia's letter to Leonard in May, 11, before they had even taken wedding vows."So I go from being half in love with you, and wanting you to be with me always, and know everything about me, to the extreme of wildness and aloofness.I sometimes think that if I married you, I could have everythingand thenis it the sexual side of it that comes between us?As I told you brutally the other day, I feel no physical attraction in you." (The Virginia Woolf Reader 47)
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In contrast, the passion of Clarissa's relationship with Sally Seton is similar to that of Woolf's passion for Vita Sackville-West.In a letter dated August, 17, Woolf calls Sackville-West "darling creature," and "dearest Creature." (The Virginia Woolf Reader 58) In August, 140 Woolf writes, "What can one sayexcept that I love you and I've got to live through this strange quiet evening thinking of you sitting there alone." (The Virginia Woolf Reader 68)Clarissa's mind, contemplating the missing piece of her marriage, turns naturally from thoughts of her virginal bed to thoughts of her girlhood with Sally Seton."Take Sally Seton; her relation in the old days with Sally Seton.Had that, after all, been love?" (Woolf )Woolf even used the same imagery when describing Clarissa's sexual state and her own.When Clarissa goes up to her bedroom, she is "like a nun withdrawing." (Woolf 1) Woolf wrote to friend Ethel Smyth, "'...but I was always sexually cowardly, my terror of real life has always kept me in a nunnery." (Virginia Woolf's Psychiatric History Sex)
Clarissa's party itself can be compared to Woolf's novels.Clarissa interprets her party as a culmination of her talents; her opportunity to shine in front of an audience and give the only gift she has to give an experience of life."What she liked was simply life.'That's what I do it for,' she said, speaking aloud, to life." (Woolf 11)At the outset of the party, Clarissa's nervousness that it will be a failure is downright paranoid, much like Woolf's paranoia at the failure of her novels.
Oh dear, it was going to be a failure; a complete failure, Clarissa felt it in her bones as dear old Lord Lexhamstood there apologizing for his wife who had caught cold at the Buckingham Palace garden party.She could see Peter out of the tail of her eye, criticizing her, there in that corner.Why, after all, did she do these things?Why seek pinnacles and stand drenched in fire?Might it consume her anyhow!Burn her to cinders! (Woolf 167)
The parallel between Clarissa's paranoia over the success of her party and Woolf's paranoid concern over the success of her novels is easily made.The fire images also create a connection between the two, as Woolf is said to use fire images consistently in connection with her mental illness, and even in describing the writing of Mrs. Dalloway."It was a subject that I have kept cooling in my mind until I felt that I could touch it without bursting into flame all over.You can't think what a raging furnace it is still to memadness and doctors and being forced." (Virginia Woolf's Psychiatric History)Woolf was even known to entertain at times, and is described to have experienced much the same anxiety over the success of the event as Clarissa.Stephen Spender, a frequent guest, remembers such an occasion."When entertaining she would, at the start of the evening, be nervous, preoccupied with serving the drinks. Her handshake and her smile of welcome would perhaps be a little distraught." (Virginia Woolf's Psychiatric History Personality)Woolf was known to gossip among her friends, and even made snobbish comments on occasion.These characteristics serve to show us that there was definitely a side of Woolf that dared to indulge in some of the pursuits of "English Society," whether she cared to admit it or not.This is not surprising, considering her distinguished family lineage.In her letters Woolf speaks of many different parties that she attended during her lifetime, and makes reference to Lady Colefax, an aristocratic woman that she did not particularly like, but was important in literary circles.Woolf's life was definitely not completely devoid of the social trappings that she seems to so detest.Perhaps this is why we are given such a sympathetic view of Clarissa without her literary talent, Woolf would have been Clarissa.Clarissa's words, while pondering the meaning behind her party, sound so much like something that Woolf would have written in her diary or to her sister, Vanessa, that it is difficult to remember that this isn't Woolf speaking casually to an associate.
All the same, that one day should follow another; Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, Saturday; that one should wake up in the morning; see the sky'; walk in he park; meet Hugh Whitbread; then suddenly in came Peter; then these roses; it was enough.After that, how unbelievable death was!that it must end; and no one in the whole world would know how she had loved it all; how every instant…(Woolf 1)
There are also smaller facts in the text that connect the two women.Peter remembers Clarissa being confined to bed with headaches on page 6, a problem that Woolf experienced throughout her life.Clarissa's sibling died when she was young; Virginia's brother Thoby died young.The reason given for Clarissa and her husband's separate beds is an illness that she experienced.Woolf often expressed the concern that her "illness" was a problem in her relationship with Leonard, and caused distance between the two.As Woolf put it in her last letter to Leonard, "…I am wasting your life.It is this madness…You can work and you will be much better without me." (The Virginia Woolf Reader 6)
The parallel between Woolf and Septimus Warren Smith is obvious their common insanity. The cause behind each of their illnesses is not such an easy thing to conclude from our vantage point, but enough background is given to make a fairly educated guess.Both thought that they were to blame for their condition, and suffered from extreme, unwarranted guilt.It is implied in the text that Septimus suffered from what came to be known as "shell-shock."His experiences in World War I were of such a disturbing nature, that they caused him to become mentally unbalanced.He was forced to kill people whom he didn't even know, and forced to watch people whom he did know die all around him.The recurring appearance of his friend Evans intimates guilt over the fact that "far from showing any emotion or recognizing that here was the end of a friendship, [Septimus] congratulated himself upon feeling very little and very reasonable." (Woolf 86)One can only imagine the effects of this, and Woolf was able to do just that.Septimus was consumed by the guilt and horror of what had happened during the war, and personified these feelings into what he describes as "human nature" (Woolf 6) and "the brute with the red nostrils." (Woolf 145)This feeling of being pursued by his personification of his mania is what led him to kill himself.
The cause behind Woolf's madness was not quite as simple as with Septimus, but probably related to a feeling of guilt, nonetheless.The fact that Woolf was sexually abused by her stepbrothers Gerald and George Duckworth as a child is widely known, and has been written about by a large amount of biographers, including nephew Quentin Bell and friend Nigel Nicholson.She also documented the abuse in diary entries and letters.Although it might seem illogical that she would feel guilt over abuse that she received, not perpetrated, current psychological theory tells just the opposite.Not only is it common for victims of sexual abuse to experience psychological problems as adults, it is also common for victims to feel extreme guilt over the events.Feelings of shame and misconduct are often reported in cases of childhood sexual abuse victims.Approximately 40% of all victims/survivors suffer aftereffects serious enough to require therapy in adulthood. Some of the aftereffects can include inability to trust (which effects the therapeutic relationship), fear of intimacy, depression, suicidal ideation and other self-destructive behaviors, and low self-esteem, guilt, anger, isolation and alienation from others, drug and alcohol dependency, and eating disorders." (McClendon 1)
Another cause of guilt for Woolf was the death of her father.In February, 104 she wrote, "The dreadful thing is that I never did enough for him all these years.He was so lonely often, and I never helped him as I might have done.This is the worst part of it now." (Virginia Woolf Psychiatric History Attacks)Chilling as it is to think about now, Woolf's mania and guilt, like Septimus, led her to kill herself.
The symptoms that Woolf was reported to have suffered almost exactly match those of Septimus.First of all, they both suffered hallucinations and claimed that they had contact with the dead.In a diary entry dated January, 14 Woolf writes, "I've had some very curious visions in this room too, lying in bed, mad, and seeing the sunlight quivering like gold water, on the wall.I've heard the voices of the dead here." (Virginia Woolf's Psychiatric History Attacks 1)Septimus has episodes of hallucinations at different point throughout the text, and has visions of his dead friend from the war, Evans.Perhaps the most memorable incident of this is in Regent's Park, where Septimus's wife, Lucrezia, takes him."There was his hand; there the dead.White things were assembling behind the railings opposite.But he dared not look.Evans was behind the railings!" (Woolf 5)
Both Woolf and Septimus share a loathing of the doctors who tried to treat their illnesses, and of course, in both of their cases, the doctors failed.The two doctors in Mrs. Dalloway are presented as completely ineffectual.First there is Dr. Holmes, who claims that there is nothing wrong with Septimus; he just needs to keep his mind on outside things.Secondly, Dr. Bradshaw, who speaks ridiculously of "proportion," as the word is even applicable to the horrors of war. (Woolf )Both doctors insist that Septimus should be sent to the countryside for a "rest-cure," an idea that Septimus is utterly opposed to, and leads him to the paranoid conviction that they were out to "get him."Right before Septimus throws himself outside the window, he hears Dr. Holmes charging up the stairs."Holmes was coming upstairs.Holmes would burst open the door.Holmes would say 'In a funk, eh?' But no; not Holmes; not Bradshaw." (Woolf 14)
Woolf felt very much the same abhorrence for her doctors, and the prescription for rest as her cure.She wrote of it to friend Ethel Smyth in June, 10, "Indeed I was almost crippled when I came back to the world, unable to move a foot in terror after that discipline.Thinknot one moment's freedom from doctor's disciplineperfectly strangeconventional men; 'You shan't read this' and 'You shan't write a word' and 'You shall lie still and drink milk'for six months." (Virginia Woolf's Psychiatric History Attacks 1)
Both Woolf and Septimus experienced the "excited stage" and "depressed stage" of mania.The excited stage includes symptoms such as continual, irrational speech, and an upswing in mood.Leonard, writing about one of Woolf's early attacks, describes her thus "She talked almost without stopping for two or three days.For about a day what she said was coherent, the sentences meant something, though it was nearly all wildly insane." (Virginia Woolf's Psychiatric History Attacks 1)Septimus's is seen to act this way on several different occasions."He would argue with [Lucrezia] about killing themselves; and explain how wicked people were; how he could see them making up lies as they passed in the street.He knew all their thoughts, he said; he knew everything.He knew the meaning of the world, he said." (Woolf 66)Their attitudes do not seem depressed; on the contrary, they speak excitedly and hurriedly.Their thoughts are coherent, but based on impossible premises.Right before Woolf's suicide, many accounts deem her to have been cheerful and productive.Septimus's last thoughts before killing himself are of life "He did not want to die.Life was good." (Woolf 14)This is typical of their illness.
Of the depressed stage of mania, there are also many examples.Symptoms of this stage include severe depression, a belief that their state cannot be helped, and is their own doing.When Septimus is asked by a doctor if he served with distinction in the war, Septimus thinks to himself, "[I have] committed an appalling crime and been condemned to death by human nature." (Woolf 6)The day before Woolf's suicide she submitted to a consultation with Dr. Wilberforce, whom she told that it was "quite unnecessary to have come." (Virginia Woolf's Psychiatric History Suicide)A recollection of Dr. Wilberforce from only a week earlier notes Woolf to have said she was "desperatedepressed to the lowest depths." (Virginia Woolf's Psychiatric History Suicide)
Another interesting parallel between the two is their writing.Septimus writes continually throughout the novel, jotting down disassociated sentences on scraps of paper everywhere he goes. "Men must not cut down trees.There is a God.(He noted such revelations on the backs of envelopes.)Change the world.No one kills from hatred.Make it known (he wrote it down)." (Woolf 4)An excerpt of Woolf's letter to Leonard in 11 sounds much the same "I had other adventures, & some disasters, the fruit of a too passionate & enquiring disposition.I avoided both love & hatred.I now feel very clear, calm and move slowly, like one of the great big animals at the zoo.Knitting is the saving of life…I must go and post this." (Virginia Woolf's Psychiatric History Attacks )Woolf also claimed that the ideas for her novels were born during periods of insanity.In 10 she writes of this "As an experience, madness is terrific I can assure you, and not to be sniffed at; and in its lava I still find most of the things I write about.It shoots out of one everything shaped, final, not in mere driblets as sanity does." (Virginia Woolf's Psychiatric History Attacks 1)A clear example of this, and an obviously autobiographical note in Mrs. Dalloway, comes from a period of seclusion in 104.Woolf is recorded to have thrown herself out of a window at a rest home, the method by which Septimus kills himself, of course.She also claimed to hear birds singing to her in Greek, as Septimus does in the park.
The last parallel to be made here is that of the sense that Woolf is constantly in battle with herself.She was a soldier in her own personal war between sanity and insanity.She makes reference to herself as "a fighter" in her diary, after feeling depressed and attacked by dismal reviews of her new book. (The Virginia Woolf Reader 8)Again on page 0, she makes reference to this idea "This idea struck me the army is the body I am the brain.Thinking is my fighting." The connection here being, obviously, that Septimus was a soldier in the English Army.A reference to Clarissa being involved in battle is also made in the novel."…taking Mrs. Dalloway's parasol, handled it like a sacred weapon which a Goddess, having acquitted herself honourably in the field of battle, sheds, and placed it in the umbrella stand." (Woolf 0)
As we see by the end of Mrs. Dalloway, Clarissa, the only sane person of the three, wins her battle. Her party is a success.Woolf and Septimus, however, are not so fortunate.Their illness, a condition apparently out of their control, gets the better of both of them.As Lucrezia ponders Septimus's intent to kill himself she thinks to herself "…it was cowardly for a man to say he would kill himself, but Septimus had fought; he was brave; he was not Septimus now."(Woolf )Likewise, Woolf writes to Leonard in her suicide note "I don't think two people could have been happier till this terrible diseased came.I can't fight any longer." (Virginia Woolf's Psychiatric History Suicide)
Works Cited
McClendon, Pat."Incest/Sexual Abuse of Children."Pat McClendon's Clinical SocialWork.11.http//www.clinicalsocialwork.com/incest.html
Ingram, Malcolm. "Virginia Woolf's Psychiatric History" 00.http//www.ourworld.compuserve.com/homepages/malcolmi/vwframe.html
Leaska, Mitchell."The Virginia Woolf Reader" Harvest Books 184.
Woolf, Virginia."Mrs. Dalloway"Harvest Books 181.
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