Jake disses chivalry.

In the last reading we did in The Sun Also Rises, we see basically everybody attack Robert Cohn, either verbally, or mentally (in Jake's case). Throughout the book, Jake has been the poster child for masculinity; he criticizes Cohn for just sitting there when Frances is yelling at him, and is always angry when Cohn does something silly or feminine. But in this section, Cohn is ready to fight for his "lady love"! He's pumped; he wants to hit Mike, let's go, man! But Jake criticizes him yet again.

I think some of this has to do with the fact that deep down (or maybe nearer to the surface than he'd like to admit), Jake really dislikes Cohn. But the other reason that Jake criticizes Cohn for this chivalrous behavior towards Brett is that Brett is the last person who would expect chivalry. She is the epitome of the 1920s independent woman. She wears a dude's hat. She drinks and stays out with Counts until all hours of the morning. She "started all that." Brett doesn't like Cohn; she's mean to him just like the others, and doesn't need to be fought for by him. She needs absolutely no one to stand up for her, and that is what Cohn is trying to do.

The whole fact that Cohn is ready to fight, and that Brett so does not want him to, is just so absurd in this context. The entire situation is ridiculous, and Jake sees this. He watches Cohn playing the knight on the white horse, and he thinks, "Really dude? Of all the girls in the entire world, you picked Brett to stand up for." It's just so comical (in a sort of sad way) to Jake, and that is why he criticizes Cohn for something that we would normally think he would appreciate.

Traditional masculine values and chivalrous behavior are all well and good, just not when Brett is concerned.

The 1920s equivalent of "no-homo."

Today in class we talked about the effect that the change of setting has on the The Sun Also Rises. Our characters are now in Spain, and this has a noticeable effect on Jake and Bill's friendship. At one point, when the two are out fishing, Bill says something that Mr. Mitchell called the 1920s equivalent of the slang term "no-homo" which one "bro" says to another "bro" after they've said something genuinely nice to each other. Bill voices his appreciation of Jake, and says that in New York, that voicing would definitely not be allowed, but here, in Spain, one can say these things.

I think this is a huge forward step in the book, because we already know that Jake and Bill are good friends, and this candid conversation just proves that. However, I was beginning to think that Hemingway would never let two male friends have an emotionally meaningful conversation, and voila! Here's one about Brett! Granted, it's only about five sentences long, but we have to start somewhere right? (In my head, I'm imagining a 12-step program for hyper-masculinity. Bros Anonymous, perhaps.)

I really liked this (almost) conversation because it made me think of Jake as opening up a little bit, and of Bill as not being ironic for a change. It was a nice change of pace, and I hope that Jake and Bill will have more of these moments. Jake's got to spill his guts to somebody at some point, right?

The hours ...and hours and hours I spent watching The Hours.

I love this movie. I think it's so clever to have three seemingly unconnected plotlines all come together at a point and I think it's even cleverer (a word?) to have one of the plot lines be Virginia Woolf's struggles with life and writing books and accidentally making out with her sister. I find historical fiction really engaging, and I love modern interpretations of old stories or lives of historical figures (though I still have yet to see that Jane Eyre movie that looked so good) and connecting Woolf's life with that of somebody reading her book, and also with somebody who had such similarities to a character in the book, was just stunning; a marvelous idea, and I really enjoyed watching the movie The Hours.

Well, enjoyed might not be the right verb. Loved, maybe. Connected with, maybe, but enjoyed is probably not right, as this movie is one of the most intense movies I have ever seen. I couldn't help but cringe through every single scene involving Richard's mother, because I felt like, at any moment, she could snap, freak out, and kill everybody in the room, including herself. Or she could just sit down at the dinner table and talk about making a cake. It was scary. But I think that's what the filmmakers were going for: they wanted to show how unstable she was, and they wanted to keep you guessing about her fate, when, if you thought about it hard enough, you would realize that you already knew her fate from something said earlier in the movie.

I could probably talk about this movie for a while, but it would end up sounding rambling and would involve a lot of I-don't-know-but-I-just-loved-it!'s. Bottom line, I loved the intensity and the layering of plots, how the characters were all intertwined but didn't know it, and the historical tinge that it had. I definitely want to rent it and watch it all over again!

Mrs. Walsh

Mrs. Walsh said she would buy the mosquito nets herself.

It was a hot, sickly sticky day in India that day, and all days, for the days were long and hot; hot as the porridge Mrs. Liamor cooked up for breakfast (she would not have any of that sub-continental stuff, heavens no!). The sun was out; was burning even though Mrs. Walsh was in her lightest white cotton dress. Peter was probably off at some meeting somewhere, she could never keep track. Was it the Pakistanis this time? Or the Bangladeshis? She could never keep track. Going on about this and that when all she, Mrs. Clarissa Walsh, was trying to do was plan her samosa party.

The Walsh's home was frightfully open; one's home had to be in this climate; but at night that openness meant the return of the bloodsucking, malarial menace; affectionately termed "The Mosqiuto." Mrs. Walsh had no time for such affectionate terms, and in fact never said their name out loud. (Peter, dear, would you please deal with "the problem.")

As she walked down her path, the sides of which were laden with all types and varieties of beautiful tropical flowers, and turned to the right, to follow the lane which led towards the village, she felt the breeze move through her skirts, heard the rustle which this momentary motion produced, and felt herself transported, at once, back to Bourton.

She could remember the passion which Peter inspired in her; for that was why she had picked to marry him over that stuffy old Dalloway character, whom Sally had once called Wickham; what a ruckus that had caused! She could also remember that there were very few mosquitoes in Bourton...and she reminisced deeper into the recesses of her mind.

Just then, lost amidst the thoughts comprising her reverie, and continuing down the lane as if in a daze, she nearly collided with a small group of children on bicycles. They were racing; Clarissa leapt out of the way and her heart leapt in her chest and she remembered what it felt to be ill; so ill as she had been; with the virus which "the problem" carried; and she had been confined to her bedroom; which she now did not share with her husband; and her heart would leap as it had just leapt as she had leapt out of the way of the passing children.

Oh, how she longed to live in England with Dalloway.


[This semi-pastiche stems from our discussion today, where Joey claimed that Clarissa would be so much happier had she married Peter, and I claimed that one could write a story (which Mr. Mitchell called Mrs. Walsh) which was the same as Mrs. Dalloway, but in which Clarissa had married Peter. So there. :)]

Great job, panel presentations!

So far, we've had three presentations on Virginia Woolf's Mrs. Dalloway and they were all fantastic! Each provoked discussion, due in part to the fascinating topics that the groups chose, and also in part to the considerable ability of the presenters! My only problem with them (the presentations, not the presenters), and this is a problem that I've been dealing with for a long while now, is my complete skepticism with regards to symbolism.

While I think it's fascinating to try to figure out exactly what the author meant by their work, I find it almost impossible to believe that they intentionally built a story around an elaborate secret scheme that the author is leaving for critics to find years later. I could see Virginia Woolf keeping the dynamic of the Demeter/Persephone myth in mind as she's writing Mrs. Dalloway, but I doubt that she's sitting at her desk thinking, "Okay, seventy years after my death, I want these kids to do a presentation on how I modeled every single character's relationship with another character off of this myth."

I know I'm exaggerating, but I've always struggled with symbolism. A lot of the time, I wish people would be able to read the book or other piece of literary with for what it is, and not try to read a whole lot of stuff (which, frankly, I believe is not there) into it.

But that's just me, and I don't mean, in any way, to demean the presentations; I thought they were all great and I enjoyed them immensely!!!

Woolf's characters are in the eyes of the beholders.

At least that's how she wants us to see them. Virginia Woolf rarely comes right out and says things like, "Peter Walsh was this kind of person, he looked this way, and enjoyed these things." Rather, Woolf will tell us what others think of Peter Walsh, for example, how passionate he is, apparently always in love; how annoying his compulsion towards his pocket-knife is, etc. Woolf never tells us these things, but the other characters do. That, is how she makes us learn about her characters: through the eyes of her other characters.

I think this is a very interesting tactic, because it means that you might get varying opinions about a character's, well, character. Let's take Hugh Whitbread: Clarissa totally loves him, and when she meets him on the street on her way to get flowers, she remembers how awesome and "admirable" he is. When Richard meets him later, Hugh is suddenly an intolerable ass.

I don't think these conflicting viewpoints are confusing. On the contrary, I think they're so much more enlightening than a simple "He was this, he was that, blah blah blah." description would have been. One rarely sees a concise, simple, and all encompassing view of a person that one meets. Rather, one meets a person in one situation, and they might act one way, then meets them in another situation, and they might act differently. This can happen without one proclaiming that one's new acquaintance has schizophrenia. One takes it in stride, and compiles a record of that person's behavior, and then decides what one's impression of that person is. (That sounds way more scientific than anything that a normal human would actually do. I'm just talking about general impressions of a person that you see in a few instances.) That is what I feel we're getting from Woolf: a few instances of different behavior, and we're left to decide for ourselves what our impressions of that person are.

Rest in peace, Septimus.

Even though the book is called Mrs. Dalloway, it could easily be called Mr. Warren Smith. At least during the last few "chapters" we've read, Septimus Warren Smith has been a pivotal character, and we are with him through every step of his day to day life, his background, his "treatment", and his eventual demise (How anything can be eventual when you're only talking about the time span of one day, I don't know.).

Two things interested me about Septimus: First, was something that Mr. Mitchell said during a class discussion last week, which is that Woolf doesn't allow her reader to write Septimus off as being a complete whackjob. She doesn't introduce him from an outsider's perspective, saying, "And then Mrs. Dalloway saw this weird lookin' dude on the side of the road who looked like he was about to have a psychotic episode at any minute." Had she said something along those lines, and then transitioned into Septimus's thoughts, we would have definitely discredited anything that he had to say. The way Woolf does introduce us, however, is much subtler, and, I think, much better. She immediately puts us into his mind, not giving us a chance to think about this guy's mental stability, and making us see things from his point of view. This tactic, I believe, makes us relate to Septimus better than we would if we already knew him to be "crazy," and I think this is a very good thing indeed.

The second thing that interested me was how relieved I was when Septimus killed himself. Please don't misunderstand me, I really enjoyed reading the sections of the book that were his thoughts, and I thought he was an incredibly sympathetic character, but after reading about so much struggle, so many misunderstandings (whether it was between Septimus and Rezia, Septimus and his various doctors, or Septimus and anyone else), and so much ignorance (mostly on the part of the doctors), I was so relieved that he didn't have to go through that anymore. There's nothing more upsetting than feeling completely secure in your beliefs and your ideas, but not being able to share them with anybody, or having anybody believe you; that's what I feel Septimus was going through, and I was happy to see it come to an end.

All in all, since we have now been both introduced and made to bade farewell to Septimus, I conclude that he's an incredibly likable, but also highly distressing character. I think that without his presence in the book, Mrs. Dalloway would be much more superficial than it is, and it would not have as serious a nature as it does. Goodbye Septimus, we love you!!!