Mrs. Dalloway
Ratings16
Average rating3.8
15
Ratings16
Average rating3.8
Mrs Dalloway, Virginia Woolf's fourth novel, offers the reader an impression of a single June day in London in 1923. Clarissa Dalloway, the wife of a Conservative member of parliament, is preparing to give an evening party, while the shell-shocked Septimus Warren Smith hears the birds in Regent's Park chattering in Greek. There seems to be nothing, except perhaps London, to link Clarissa and Septimus. She is middle-aged and prosperous, with a sheltered happy life behind her; Smith is young, poor, and driven to hatred of himself and the whole human race. Yet both share a terror of existence, and sense the pull of death. The world of Mrs Dalloway is evoked in Woolf's famous stream of consciousness style, in a lyrical and haunting language which has made this, from its publication in 1925, one of her most popular novels.
Reviews with the most likes.
A book that is almost entirely description and no plot, written in a stream-of-consciousness style; in short, my ultimate snooze-fest. There were times this weekend when I felt open to description that served no purpose, to simply have a picture painted in my mind, and at these times I liked the book. The rest of the weekend I was more my normal self, wanting a story that would grab me and whisk me away, and at these times I was bored with the book. Glad to have read it in case it comes up sometime in my life, and that's about the best feeling I can muster for this book.
