Mrs. Dalloway Blog #1

After learning about Virginia Woolfs life history and her upbringing I was very intrigued at it was easy to make comparisons between her and the characters she writes about in Mrs. Dalloway. We were told about her depression and moods that resulted in multiple suicide attempts along with the tragic events that ultimately lead to her feeling that way. We also learned that she was married even though it was supposed that she had multiple affairs with women. These two facts about her life relate to two characters in her book. Septimus is a World War 1 veteran who essentially suffers from PTSD, experiences hallucinations and has sucicidal thoughts and tendencies. Since Virginia herself attempted suicide multiple times and ultimatly ended her life on her 4th attempt a conclusion can be drawn that she’s using this character in a way to express her inner thoughts or struggles. Then the main character, Clarissa Dalloway can also be considered a portrayal of Virginia as she has a female love interest, Sally, throughout the story. The storyline of Clarissa and Sally is viewed as a strong friendship as homosexuality was not widley accepted during this time. They share a kiss and Clarissa feels deeply toward it. She feels the way that men feel towards women, but she disregards her feelings as same sex attraction and believes it to really be only a strong friendship. This makes me wonder if Virginia also felt this in her life as she seems to be connecting the characters to helfself in some way. In a sense it seems like Septimus is a symbol for her past and her trauma that she experienced growing up and haunting her and Clarissa is the symbol for her day to day struggles with her sexuality and feelings. Ultimately I think the lack of self awareness and acceptance pushed her to take her own life rather than her trauma from her past. As we read more of the story there might be even more comparisons with characters to her own life that help us understand Virginia and her thoughts.