Mrs Dalloway

 The textual conversations between the seminal of Mrs Dalloway and The Hours as an appropriated text reveals the persistence of misogyny and its consequences on female autonomy through a repression of multidimensionality. However Daldry’s reinterpretation allows self-actualisation after witnessing the death of the visionary, with representation of a postmodern context.

introduction

Mrs Dalloway being set in a post WW1 modernist context reflects her milieu’s concerns of the restriction upon women, as the paradigmatic shifts in patriarchal heteronormative standards reveal the female desire for connection and authenticity. The stream of consciousness shows Clarissa’s existential reflection in, “This is being Mrs Dalloway, not even Clarissa anymore. This is being Mrs Richard Dalloway”.  The utilisation of sardonic tone highlights her acute sense towards her fragmented, multidimensional identity from her loss of subjectivity as being labelled “Mrs” reduces her to an attachment of her husband, whilst managing her public role and the internalisation of societal expectation. However Clarissa’s deviation against heteronormativity in her relationship with Sally resists phallocentrism to present a fleeting but profound appreciation in unconventional relationships. The hyperbolic phrasing of “The whole world might have turned upside down!... there she was alone with Sally.” highlights a self-realisation of overwhelming joy as the dissolving of traditional relationships starkly contrasts her relationship with Richard. Although her joy remains fleeting due to the conservative times as Sally’s transformation to “Lady Rosseter”, underscores the elusive and unattainable nature of these connections, as external, restrictive patriarchal pressures obscure female connection. This repression of relationship is used by Woolf to explore the obscuring of female desires due to these phallocentric ideals.

Paragraph 1

Daldry’s The Hours extends upon female struggles of repression of multidimensionality from society’s persistence of patriarchal constructs of heteronormativity despite shifts in women’s autonomy. The intertextual connections to Woolf’s modernist concerns are continued, but Daldry’s appropriation deconstructs traditional notions of domestic happiness and female progress in differing feminist contexts. The 3 protagonists; Virginia, Laura and Clarissa lying in a foetal position serves as a symbol of the circular monotony of emotional withdrawal and turmoil. The decentralising narrative authority demonstrates continued unhappiness despite social progression and evolving autonomy in women. Laura reveals the hollowness of the American Dream that was progressive in its ideologies as she watches her husband leave for work whilst positioned behind the window and curtains. This symbolises her confinement to domesticity as her falling facial expression after he leaves stresses the source of her depression is the performative role as housewife. Daldry’s continuation of forbidden relationships with Laura and Kitty’s sapphic kiss and shifting camera angles, highlights the mutual affection of sincerity and its redemptive possibilities of bringing connection and happiness. However, Kitty’s disregard of this moment by diverting to Mrs Dalloway, emphasises the continued conformity of the 1920s persists in the social milieu of the 1950s. This continued struggles for Laura as she returns to the depressive role of housewife highlights the incredulity of female progression leading to happiness.

Paragraph 2

Clarissa’s response to the visionary’s death in Mrs Dalloway reveals brief moments of self-liberation, despite being constrained by heteronormative expectations that suppress her complex identity. The visionary’s death releases Clarissa from the restrictions of being internally trapped due to the limitations of heterogeneity in a modernist, conservative world. Clarissa mirrors Septimus’ suicide, “Death was defiance… an attempt to communicate” to a defying from external societal demands for herself. The reverential symbolism elevates his death as she perceives it as the only way to preserve one’s individuality in a conformist society. Her satisfaction with his death represents how women’s social bodies were governed by domestic and heterosexual expectation, but the visionary body’s death allows Clarissa to experience moments of ecstatic, queer sensations, contemplating self-liberation with no societal repercussions. Clarissa’s apotheosising in “She felt glad that he had done it; thrown it away while they went on living” reveals fleeting happiness as his death purified the social self, whilst aware of her entrapment. This functions as a visionary gesture to Clarissa that she can contemplate the possibilities of self-liberation and the boundaries of selfhood from societal constraints, despite her physical restriction. 

Paragraph 3

The Hours aligns with the function of death of the visionary, but Daldry’s continued skepticism on progression and happiness extends to thereby reveal the multidimensional nature of women. Vaughan’s autonomy in a post-feminist world is demonstrated in her externalisation her homosexual relationships and agency in her occupation. However, she remains mentally isolated and burdened, which parallels Laura and Virginia as seen in the high angle shot of her mental breakdown when she sees Lewis Water. The breakdown in a typical domestic space of the kitchen uncovers how evolving progression in female autonomy does not guarantee a resolvement of her internal struggles. Daldry explores her complexity as she balances the role as caregiver to Richard, whilst contemplating her potential if she had lived for herself. However Richard's death as the visionary body allows Clarissa a modicum of self-actualisation to appreciate life, as she is able to live for herself. The close shot of Sally and Clarissa’s intimate kiss of mutual exchange represents emotional fulfilment as Vaughan can appreciate Sally following Richards purifying suicide, choosing life unlike Laura’s social death and Virginia’s suicide. However Daldry demonstrates realistic possibilities of female happiness despite the persistence of life’s complexity, as the revealed multidimensionality of Clarissa is shown in her capacity for growth and acceptance towards the realities of her world. 

Paragraph 4

Daldry repurposes old notions to better fit his social milieu by continuing the complexities of women and their restrictions. He depicts notions of self-actualisation in a realistic, postmodern representation after the titular character witnesses the death of the visionary. 

Conclusion