Clarissa Dalloway and Septimus Smith
Clarissa Dalloway and Septimus SmithClarissa Dalloway and Septimus Smith
In Virginia Woolf’s book, Mrs. Dalloway, Clarissa Dalloway and Septimus Warren Smith grow up under the same social institutions. Although social classes are drawn upon wealth, it can be conceived that two people may have very similar opinions of the society that created them. Woolf presents individuals that are uncannily similar in Mrs. Dalloway.
Clarissa and Septimus share the quality of expression through actions, not words. Through their basic beliefs and idiosyncrasies, both characters mimic each other through their actions and thoughts, although they never meet. Clarissa feels sadness and death around her. There is much routine and habit around her but she still seems dissatisfied. In her early fifties, she sees herself as Mrs. Dalloway, not even Clarissa. She portrays her sense of happiness as something not monumental or grandiose, but rather quite simple. She can be happy throwing a party, so she can escape reality: “Every time she gave a party she had this feeling of being something not herself, and that everyone was unreal in one way; much more real in another…it was possible to say things you couldn’t say anyhow else, things that needed an effort; possible to go much deeper. But not for her; not yet anyhow” (171).
Ever since Septimus saw his best friend Evans die at war, it has been a major trauma in his life. His wife, Rezia, must constantly take him away from his reality and have him focus on things not involving war or him thinking of it. Septimus sees beauty in small, lifeless things that surround him. Beauty can be seen as a plane that writes in the sky, undeciphered, but which signifies beauty. Subconsciously, he reveals his need to be nurtured, but he pulls away from society when he falls ill and has trouble dealing with reality. Both Septimus and Clarissa are very similar in this manner.
Death is perceived as defiance by both characters. Clarissa expresses her belief in reincarnation. She believes if her true self is not revealed in this life, it will be revealed in the next. She has the belief that everything will work out, eventually. Thinking of Septimus’s death, Clarissa remembers thinking before a party, “If it were to now die, ’twere now to be most happy” (184). She felt if she was to die, it was a good point in her life to die. As for Septimus, he knows of war, death, and destruction; he knows that society will not change and that he cannot live in a world that can be so constricting. Septimus takes a leap of faith and ends all of his suffering in this unforgiving world; individuality, Septimus and Clarissa recede into the depths of normality. Clarissa accepts this recession, from having a dream to being merely...
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