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Description edit
Heralded as Virginia Woolf's greatest novel, this is a vivid portrait of a single day in a woman's life. When we meet her, Mrs. Clarissa Dalloway is preoccupied with the last-minute details of party preparation while in her mind she is something much more than a perfect society hostess. As she... read more
Ridiculously Simplified Synopsis edit
Characters/People edit
- Mrs. Clarissa Dalloway: Protagonist
- Mr. Richard Dalloway: Mrs. Dalloway's husband
- Peter Walsh: Mrs. Dalloway's friend, one-time suitor
- Sally: Mrs. Dalloway's friend
- Sir William Bradshaw: doctor
- Rézia: Septimus' Italian wife.
- Septimus Warren Smith: Recovering World War I veteran
- Hugh Whitbread: Mrs. Dalloway's friendHugh Whitbread pasaba por allí, sin rumbo, con su chaleco blanco, sombrío, gordo, ciego, pasando de largo ante todo lo que veía, salvo ante la autoestima y la comodidad.
- Elizabeth: Clarissa and Richard's only daughter.
- Doris Kilman: Elizabeth’s history teacher, who has German ancestry.
- Lady Bruton: Add a description of this character.
- Dr. Holmes
- Lucrezia: Septimus' Italian wife.
- Ellie Henderson
- Mrs. Filmer
- Mrs. Peters
- Helena
- Evans
- Lady Bradshaw
- Mr. Brewer
- Millicent Bruton
- Mrs. Walker
- Mrs. Dempster
- Mr. Whittaker
- Mrs. Marsham
- Daisy
- Mrs. Hilbery
- Lucy
- Mrs. Elmer
- Mrs. Barnet
- Milton
- Harry
- Gordon
- Maisie Johnson
- Milly Brush
Quotes edit
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“What is this terror? What is this ecstasy? he thought to himself. What is it that fills me with this extraordinary excitement? It is Clarissa, he said. For there she was.”
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“She had the oddest sense of being herself invisible; unseen; unknown; there being no more marrying, no more having of children now, but only this astonishing and rather solemn progress with the rest of them, up Bond Street, this being Mrs. Dalloway; not even Clarissa any more; this being Mrs. Richard Dalloway.”
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“Mrs. Dalloway said she would buy the flowers herself.”
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“A thing there was that mattered; a thing wreathed with chatter, defaced, obscured in her own life, let drop everyday in corruption, lies, chatter. This he had preserved. Death was defiance. Death was an attempt to communicate; people feeling the impossibility of reaching the centre which, mystically, evaded them; closeness drew apart; rapture faded, one was alone. There was an embrace in death”
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“She felt somehow very like him--the young man who had killed himself. She felt glad that he had done it; thrown it away. The clock was striking. The leaden circles dissolved in the air. He made her feel the beauty; made her feel the fun. But she must go back”
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She had the oddest sense of being herself invisible, unseen; unknown; there being no more marrying, no more having of children now, but only this astonishing and rather solemn progress with the rest of them, up Bond Street, this being Mrs. Dalloway; not even Clarissa any more; this being Mrs. Richard Dalloway.
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She could see what she lacked. It was not beauty; it was not mind. It was something central which permeated; something warm which broke up surfaces and rippled the cold contact of man and woman, or of women together.
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Then came the most exquisite moment of her whole life passing a stone urn with flowers in it. Sally stopped; picked a flower; kissed her on the lips.
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For the truth is (let her ignore it) that human beings have neither kindness, nor faith, nor charity beyond what serves to increase the pleasure of the moment.
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One cannot bring children into a world like this. One cannot perpetuate suffering, or increase the breed of these lustful animals, who have no lasting emotions, but only whims and vanities, eddying them now this way, now that.
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Did it matter then, she asked herself, walking towards Bond Street, did it matter that she must inevitably cease completely; all this must go on without her; did she resent it; or did it not become consoling to believe that death ended absolutely?
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for women live much more in the past than we do, he thought. They attach themselves to places; and their fathers—a woman's always proud of her father.
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It ended in a transcendental theory which, with her horror of death, allowed her to believe, or say that she believed (for all her scepticism), that since our apparitions, the part of us which appears, are so momentary compared with the other, the unseen part of us, which spreads wide, the unseen might survive, be recovered somehow attached to this person or that, or even haunting certain places after death ... perhaps—perhaps.
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Her only gift was knowing people almost by instinct, she thought, walking on.
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She sliced like a knife through everything; at the same time was outside, looking on. She had a perpetual sense, as she watched the taxi cabs, of being out, out, far out to sea and alone; she always had the feeling that it was very, very dangerous to live even one day.
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Setting & Locations edit
- London
- Bourton
- India
- England
- Bond Street: Bond Street la fascinaba; Bond Street muy de mañana en plena temporada; sus banderas ondeando; sus tiendas; sin excesos; sin resplandor; un rollo de tweed en la tienda donde su padre se había comprado los trajes durante cincuenta años; unas cuantas perlas; el salmón encima de un taco de hielo.
- Regent's Park
- Manchester, England
- Piccadilly
- Harley Street
- Whitehall
- Burma
- Kensington
- Buckingham Palace
- Westminster
- Victoria Street
- Big Ben
- Arlington Street
- Piccadilly Circus
- Trafalgar Square
- Tottenham Court Road
- Mayfair
- St. Paul's Cathedral
- Fleet Street
First Sentence edit
Mrs. Dalloway said she would buy the flowers herself.
Table of Contents edit
There are no chapters in Mrs. Dalloway.
Series & Lists edit
This is book 698 of 1271 in 1001 Books You Must Read Before You Die. (authoritative list)
Preceded by Manhattan Transfer, and followed by The Great Gatsby.
This is book 24 of 96 in Newsweek's Top 100 Books: The Meta-List. (authoritative list)
Preceded by Brave New World, and followed by Native Son.
This book is in TIME Magazine Top 100 English-Language Novels. (community list)
This book is in Guardian 1000 Novels Everyone Must Read. (authoritative list)
This book is in Hopeless Romantic. (community list)
This is book 107 of 214 in Best English-Language Fiction of the 20th Century. (authoritative list)
Preceded by The Secret Agent, and followed by A Good Man Is Hard to Find.
First Edition edit
Original Language: English
Publisher: Hogarth Press
Country: England
Publication Date: May 25 1925
ISBN: 0156628708
Page Count: 293
Publisher: Hogarth Press
Country: England
Publication Date: May 25 1925
ISBN: 0156628708
Page Count: 293
Classification edit
- Library of Congress: Add the Library of Congress Classification.
- Dewey: 828'.912
Notes for Parents edit
Reading Level: Young AdultsThis novel hints at homosexuality and characters deal with thoughts of suicide and death.
Subjects edit
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Links to Supplemental Material edit
Movie Connections edit
- Mrs. Dalloway (IMDb): 1997 release.
- The Hours (IMDb): 2002 release.
Books Influenced by This Book edit
Books That Cite This Book edit
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