Mrs. Dalloway

Mrs. Dalloway is a novel by Virginia Woolf, first published in 1925. The book details a day in the life of Clarissa Dalloway in post-World War I England.

Clarissa Dalloway is an upper-class society hostess, married to a Conservative MP, who throws a party and reflects on her life. The story takes place on a single day in 1923, beginning in the morning and ending when the guests leave the party.

Peter Walsh, a former suitor, returns from India and visits Clarissa that morning, stirring memories of their youth and of the choices that shaped her marriage. He later attends the evening party.

In a parallel narrative, Septimus Warren Smith is a shell-shocked veteran of the First World War, tormented by the death of his friend and commanding officer, Evans, and by hallucinations. Septimus never meets Clarissa. Fearing that his doctors will commit him to an institution, he dies by suicide that afternoon; Clarissa hears about the stranger’s death from guests at her party.

By juxtaposing Clarissa and Septimus, the novel examines postwar trauma, isolation, mortality, and social pressure, while moving between private consciousness and public life.