Dualism Of Life: A Thematic Study Of Mrs. Dalloway

Virginia Woolf (1882-1941) is one of the most important female writers in the 20th century British literature history, and one of the most outstanding representatives of the British novelists on stream of consciousness.Woolf is a productive writer. She writes nine novels in her life, among which Mrs. Dalloway is considered as a mature representation of stream of consciousness novel. Employing skills like interior monologue, free imagination, montage, symbolism etc, Woolf presents the readers the life of London after WWI.Since its publication in the beginning of the 20th century, the novel has received serious critical attention from reviewers and essayists. From the 1920s to the 1940s, the criticism mainly focuses on the novel's innovation and experimentalism. The research shifts to philosophy, psychology and myth from the 1950s to the 1960s. From the 1970s to the1980s the critics begin to understand the novel from the angle of feminism, modernism and aesthetics. Historicism and postcolonialism have become new research topic since the 1980s.These perspectives are meaningful to understand the novel, but they have ignored one important point that the novel is characterized by one feature—duality which echoes well with Woolf's androgyny concept. Woolf first uses androgyny in A Room of One's Own. It is a very ancient idea, representing unity and wholeness in many philosophical and religious systems. For instance, the opposition between masculine and feminine often serves as a paradigm for other dualisms.This thesis aims to explore the novel Mrs. Dalloway from this angle. The thesis has five parts. The first part is the Introduction. This part is mainly about the early influences on Virginia Woolf's life and early studies on Mrs. Dalloway. The following three parts are the main body of this thesis.The first chapter discusses the world which are perceived respectively by the esteemed lady Mrs. Dalloway and the WWI veteran Stephen Septimus who has some mental problems. Though the two characters are different in gender, social position and health condition, they share the same world view. They are both passionate for the beauty of life and also hate the forcing power of conversion. They are obsessed by the thought of death and troubled by married life. In my opinion, Woolf's intention in portraying the two characters is to illustrate that life is constituted by oppositions but oppositions do not mean to be contradictories. It is a clear illustration of dualism, a coexistence of oppositions.The second chapter is about the world in which isolation and connection coexist. By analyzing the problems that the characters meet when they try to communicate, it can be conclude that privacy and intimacy are the two basic needs of human being. Though they are opposed against each other, they are both indispensable for a harmonious life. Both the two extremes are to be avoided and they should be balanced to a state of equilibrium. This also reflects the concept of dualism, a unity and wholeness of extremes.The third chapter mainly focuses on time. Employing two different ways to describe time, the author presents the reader a world which is ephemeral and also eternal. The clock time which never stops signifies the ephemeral world. Everything is changing and dying at each minute. On the other hand, the psychological time stands for the eternal world. Since memory can return again, the past can reappear at the present. The two are the two pillars of the novel, picturing an elapsing and everlasting world. This again echoes with the dualism concept. Once oppositions are balanced, they can enjoy restless serene.The last part of this thesis is the conclusion. This part serves to sum up the whole thesis. By generalizing the three chapters, the conclusion aims to point out that the concept of androgyny plays a great role in the novel. Dualism is the center theme, beneath which the reader can dig out many sub branches. It is really enlightening to read the novel through the angle of dualism.