Women in Virginia Woolfs Work - Essay Example

 Women in Virginia Woolf’s Work Woolf’s novels “Mrs Dalloway” and “Jacob’s Room” highlight the position of women in Victorian England, as being bound and restricted by societal norms, unable to express themselves freely, especially in matters pertaining to their sexuality. In the novel Jacob’s Room, Woolf is able to satirically point out the censorship occurring in Victorian England by the manner in which she highlights the need to discussion of sexuality, yet suppresses it deliberately in a manner akin to the censorship of society. In the novel Mrs Dalloway, Virginia Woolf has portrayed the female characters in such a way that they appear to feel inferior and inadequate, there is a dissatisfaction with their lives because of the restrictions that are imposed upon them by the class bound society within which they live. Hence both these novels suggest that women were forced to exist in a restrictive framework which was unhealthy and constricting. In assessing Woolf’s work “Mrs Dalloway” in comparison with the work of James Joyce, Krutch (1925) articulates the view that “Mrs Woolf prefers to choose her characters from among those who, owing an allegiance to good society, have had both their manners and their thoughts disciplined by its conventions”. This may be noted also in Mrs Dalloway, where the background of the party and the events of the day serve as the backdrop for the stream of consciousness thoughts flowing in Mrs Dalloway’s mind, which reveal the pain, dissatisfaction and lack of contentment experienced by the principal character as well as other female characters in the novel, due to the restrictions imposed upon them by society of which men are the rulers. Men in the story are sometimes portrayed as intrusive elements, that barge into the unfolding relationships and interactions between women. Clarissa Dalloway clearly places more importance on her relationships with other women as opposed to men, because men are the dominant elements in society – aggressive and intrusive. For example, Sally Seton is akin to a maternal figure for Clarissa, despite the fact that they are so close in age. Peter Walsh on the other hand, is the man who used to be in love with Clarissa when she was younger. During the close, intimate moment when Sally Seton kisses Clarissa and Peter Walsh walks in, Mrs Dalloway describes her feelings of outrage: “It was like running one's face against a granite wall in the darkness! It was shocking; it was horrible! ... She felt only how Sally was being mauled already, maltreated; she felt his hostility, his jealousy; his determination to break into their companionship.... "Oh this horror!" she said to herself, as if she had known all along that something would interrupt, would embitter her moment of happiness. (Woolf, 53). There is a suggestion here that the male figure is attempting to break up the bond between the women, which is providing Clarissa a great deal of happiness. It is as if the jealous male is trying to interfere in the developing bond between women, trying to break them up and silence them in order to keep them powerless. The manner in which Clarissa refers to it as a “horror” reflects her extent of her outrage. When combined with Clarissa’s refusal to marry Peter, the underlying impression conveyed is that men are rather unpleasant and are always attempting to divide women in order that they are unable to become empowered through enhanced bonds between them. Cramer (1992) suggests that the pattern revealed by Woolf in Mrs Dalloway, of men interrupting, silencing and dividing women is also akin to forcing them into heterosexual relationships. Cramer reads Sally, Clarissa and Doris Kilman as being lesbian characters and suggests that this forced heterosexuality is producing a negative consequence in the women, so that “they spoke of marriage always as a catastrophe” (Woolf 50). This reinforces the impression of pain that is caused to women by men, through the forced separation of the sexes. In the story, the stream of consciousness method which has been used also reveals some of Clarissa’s innermost thoughts, in which she reveals her deepest fears as being the crime of forcing the soul, which has a deeper connotation of the male forcing himself upon the female through marriage or through a forced relationship with her by means of rape. For example, Mrs Dalloway, in thinking about love is of the view that to love makes one solitary (Woolf 33) and as a married woman, she sees herself alone and in darkness (Woolf 35). The impression that the state of marriage and forced bonding with a man is an undesirable one is reflected in her view that “everyone gives up something when they marry” (Woolf 99). This reflects her inner state of isolation that she experiences as a woman in a male dominated and ordered society, where the woman plays a subordinate role to men. Woolf thus presents the state of marriage as one where women lose something, and this is presented through other events in the story as being a loss of independence and freedom, and the ability to live in a community with other women with less interference or dominance from men. Woolf has highlighted this impression throughout the story, pointing out the segregation of the sexes at every point and at several instances, she highlights the pain experienced by the female characters at this separation from other females and the inability to form loving bonds with other females. The forced marriage and heterosexual relationships which women have to enter into create a state of pain and isolation in the female characters. For example, in the case of Sally, Clarissa’s classmate and the mother of five children, Woolf states, “Despairing of human relationships (people were so difficult) she often went into her garden and got from her flowers a peace which men and women never gave her. (Woolf 293-294). Another such example is that of Maisie Johnson, who appears at the party for a brief while and observing her, another female character, Mrs Dempster thinks, “That girl….don’t know a thing yet”, because she is still blissfully out of the world of marriage and is still at the stage where she is in loving relationships with females. Mrs Dempstr then predicts to herself the future of the girl: “Get married, she thought, and then you'll know.... Every man has his ways. But whether I'd have chosen quite like that if I could have known, thought Mrs. Dempster, and could not help wishing to whisper a word to Maisie Johnson….”(Woolf, 39-40). The word she wishes to have with Maisie Johnson in effect is a word of warning, about the horrors and dissatisfaction she can expect to experience after being forced to conform to the role society has subscribed for her. The story of “Jacob’s Room” deals with the experiences of Jacob Flanders, who is a misunderstood person, perceived as socially awkward and inferior to others. The character has sensual encounters with three women during his brief life, but Woolf uses the story of this character to express her frustration at the restrictive mores of Victorian society. Harris (1997) discusses how Woolf has skillfully avoided all overt discussion of Jacob’s sexuality, in much the same manner in which Victorian society rejected it, but the manner in which she subtly directs the readers attention towards noticing the gap left by “this censorship” is akin to a “satirical reaction to Edwardian prudery.” (Harris 1997). Harris points out that one of the central issues that is dealt with in “Jacob’s room” is the policing of sexuality in the society prevailing at that time. Harris(1997) points out how the narration in Jacob’s Room helps to heighten the impression of forbidden things that must not be discussed, through the character of Florinda, who appears to Jacob at first as “wild and beautiful” (Woolfb, 78) and “straight and beautiful in body” (Woolfb, 82). However the beauty also appears to go hand in hand with stupidity, because the narrator’s remarks about her is satirical; for instance the name of the character itself signifies that “the flower of her maidenhood was still unplucked” (Woolfb, 77) and her chastity is abnormally important such that “the question of whether or not she was a virgin” becomes “the only thing of any importance at all” (Woolfb, 79). But Woolf does not resolve this issue throughout the story and keeps it in suspense, so that a frank discussion of sexuality is totally avoided despite it being crucial to the story. All discussion of Jacob’s sexuality is also avoided in the story. Woolf satirically highlights the suppression of such information in Victorian England through the example of Jacob’s thesis on sexuality. This thesis - “the ethics of indecency” is not suitable to be printed, because it comes back from all the magazines – “the lid shut upon truth.” Hence, the message is clear – truth about sexuality is not up for discussion in Victorian England (Woolfb, 70). It is Jacob’s interest in sexuality that is highlighted time and again throughout the story, yet the author pointedly eliminates all references to such sexuality, which leads him into his affairs with different women, thus clarifying and emphasizing their absence, due to the censorship imposed by Edwardian society. Another female character in “Jacob’s room” is Clara, a woman who falls in love with him. Yet, she writes about him in her diary, “I like Jacob Flanders. He is so unworldly…and one can say what one likes to him, though he’s frightening because…..”(Woolfb, 71). Here again, the reader is made aware that the subject which is being discussed is Jacob’s sexuality, which also fascinates Clara and makes him frightening because he is different and seems able to discuss forbidden things. Yet, rather than continue with the discussion, Clara stops and censors herself, refusing to discuss the issue further. This only reflects the manner in which all overt discussion about sexuality is forbidden and can only be left below the surface. Through the characters of both these women, Woolf is able to illustrate the difficult position of women in Edwardian England, where their very existence is all tied up with their sexuality and virginity, yet this is a matter that must forever be hushed and not spoken of. Women such as Clara are not to discuss their sexuality or think about it in any way, and the manner in which Clara automatically stops her diary and leaves her sentence half finished only highlights the external society within which these women have to operate, where the discussion of sexuality can never become a full blown one, but must only be relegated to the status of tiny ripples. She also draws subtle references to the non-exploration of sexuality and the unknown terrain it signifies - “The streets of London have their map but our passions are uncharted. What are you going to meet if you turn this corner?” (Woolfb, 129). This only serves to highlight the fact that passions are uncharted and therefore an unknown entity because the mores of society keep it an unknown territory, especially for women who are not allowed to freely explore their sexuality but must always repress it. The heterosexual relationships between Jacob and his women in the novel relegates them to “traditionally subservient and stereotypical roles”, while same sex relations are represented as being more free, in that they are not constrained by the social expectations and notions about courtship and marriage.(Hollander, 2007). This is also the case in Mrs Dalloway, where the same sex female relationships are portrayed as being more free and satisfying to the women in question, such as Sally Seton and Clarissa Dalloway, for example. Woolf thus emphasizes the repressed position of women in Victorian society and the manner in which they are expected to conform to societal expectations. Through an avoidance of direct discussion of sexuality, the novel Jacob’s room only serves to mockingly accentuate the censorship of sexuality. In both novels, Woolf represents women as characters who are unhappy and dissatisfied inside themselves, unable to give vent to their deepest desires or learn about their own sexual natures, expected to conform rather to the formal expectations of society about courtship and marriage. References: * Cramer, Patricia, 1992. "Notes from Underground: Lesbian Ritual in the Writings of Virginia Woolf." IN “Virginia Woolf Miscellanies: Proceedings of the First Annual Conference on Virginia Woolf” (edn Mark Hussey and Vara Neverow-Turk, Lanham). Maryland: UP of America, at pp 177-88. * Harris, Susan C, 1997. “The ethics of indecency: censorship, sexuality and the voice of the academy in the narration of ‘Jacob’s room’,” Twentieth Century Literature, 43(4): 420-439 * Hollander, Rachel, 2007. “Novel ethics: Alterity and form in Jacob’s Room”, New English Literature, 53(1): 40-67 * Krutch, Joseph Wood, 1925. “The stream of consciousness”, The Nation, CXX (3125): 631-32 * Woolf, Virginia, 1925. “Mrs Dalloway”, New York: Harcourt. * Woolf, Virginia, b, 1922. “Jacob’s Room”, New York: Harcourt. Critically Examine Ways in Which Virginia Woolfe Critiques the Position of Women in the Early Twentieth Century in 'Mrs Dalloway' and 'Jacob's Room' Read More