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Unit 29: Virginia Woolf — Mrs. Dalloway: Detailed Study of Text

As Elizabeth looked for her gloves, Miss. Kilman desperately hoped the girl would stay with Notes
her longer. But, Elizabeth wanted to go. Miss. Kilman detained her by saying that she had not
finished eating. She asked Elizabeth if she would go to her mother’s party. Elizabeth responded
that she would probably have to, though she did not like parties. Miss Kilman replied that she
never went to parties because she was never invited. She continued talking, feeling sorry for
herself and driving a small wedge between herself and Elizabeth. Elizabeth then paid her bill
and left.

Part II Section Three Analysis

The theme of the sea as symbolic of life is invoked as Richard returns from the luncheon with
flowers for Clarissa. The suspense is properly built for the moment where Richard will tell
Clarissa he loves her. Clarissa has been visited by Peter that morning, and her thoughts
continually stray to him. Richard has been provoked to this moment of passion by the very
mention of Peter and finally breaks from Hugh so that he can return to Clarissa, the happiness
of his life. As he enters their home, the bell signifies the break in time and progression. Woolf
writes, “And the sound of the bell flooded the room with its melancholy wave; which receded,
and gathered itself together to fall once more, when she heard distractingly, something fumbling,
something scratching at the door.” The sure-handed prose certainly does not introduce the
seeming moment of passion the reader expects. Instead, Woolf’s verbiage here reads more like
Edgar Allan Poe, foreshadowing a dreaded event through repetition and imagery. The melancholy
waves gather their force only to stumble and fumble about. One expects some kind of monster
to enter behind this sea rather than a loving husband with flowers. Woolf foreshadows the
failure of Richard to say “love you” and to properly communicate with his wife by describing
the failed motion of a wave, having to retreat after crashing, only to gather, and crash once
more.
Similarly, the reader gets the feeling that Richard has hoped to express his love to Clarissa at
other times as well, but has also failed. The failed connection exists between husband and
wife, between fellow humans. Clarissa’s conversation still returns to Peter. Richard holds her
hand, but a gulf exists between husband and wife that allows little verbal connection to take
hold. The theme of insanity coupled with sanity appears in this context as Maureen Howard,
author of the introduction to the novel, illuminates. She writes, “...Virginia Woolf knew from
her own illness how close to endurance and civilization lay insanity and mayhem...It is so
difficult to endow our words with meaning. ...Clarity, like simple sentences - ‘I love you’ - is
hard to come by.” In a war-torn world, crumbled and disillusioned following World War I,
Woolf attempted to illustrate the difficulty of simply living. Howard elaborates, “In Mrs.
Dalloway, she began to assemble the bits and pieces, to find the angles, the original voice that
would make us feel” and thus, communicate successfully again.
In this sense, Richard is no more connected to the meetings he attends. In fact, he fails to know
if he is meeting to discuss the Armenians or Albanians. The importance of his societal duties
is undermined by his nonchalance, commenting on Woolf’s view of the English upper classes
and the state of all-important English duty. The reader is acquainted with Richard’s many
good qualities, yet his loyalty to the status quo and the establishment is mirrored in his
leaving his wife for a meeting that he obviously does not care about and in the awe he feels
toward Lady Bruton’s family history.

Ironically, Clarissa’s parties are developed by Woolf, in contrast to Richard’s work, as entities
of value and significance. Both Peter and Richard, whose opinions she relies most upon, judge
Clarissa’s parties harshly. However, in this section of the novel, Clarissa comes to realize why
her parties are so important to her and the reader learns that the parties signify Clarissa’s gift

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