To tell the truth, I was thoroughly annoyed by Phillip Glass' music for The Hours.
What? You were expecting something positive out of me? Fine.
I went back and listened to the music on YouTube, and found it quite enjoyable. There's nothing objectively wrong with the notes themselves. The problems don't arise until you overlay the music with the film.
While watching the film, I was very much thinking about it in the context of Mrs. Dalloway due to the intentional parallels between the film and the book. Woolf constantly delves into the thoughts of her characters, which can't be shown nearly as well in a visual medium. The music at times seemed to be trying to replace the inner dialogues of the characters and completely failing because it is hardly as precise as words. Is it supposed to be ominous? It certainly seems ominous in the film, but without the visuals the music is rather relaxing.
Additionally, Mrs. Dalloway does not seem like the kind of world that would have background music. Clarissa is too attuned to the details of the city; her background music should be carts rattling, shoes clicking, people babbling, pigeons cooing at each other, and Big Ben gonging every once in a while.
Even the whole "the music should make the viewer aware of the passage of time" deal got on my nerves... probably not what was intended when it was written. Yes, the music made me aware of the passage of time. It made me aware of just how long some portions of the movie were. Like when there would be a bit of dialogue and then
MUSIC MUSIC MUSIC MUSIC MUSIC MUSIC MUSIC MUSIC MUSIC MUSIC MUSIC
some more dialogue. Instead of having awkward silences or dramatic pauses, the film ended up with moments like when you call customer services and the robot on the other end says "please hold," followed by
MUZAK MUZAK MUZAK MUZAK MUZAK MUZAK MUZAK MUZAK MUZAK MUZAK
maybe with an advertisement every once in a while, until eventually your call is answered in the order it was received.
Most of all, the constant music made it seem like there was always something going on... when there really wasn't ever much going on. We already knew that Woolf was going to commit suicide 18 years after the events of her part of the film... because we read Mrs. Dalloway, we saw Richard's suicide coming a mile away... the only part with a plot that could surprise us was the 1950s section, and how did that turn out? She's going to kill herself, says the over-dramatic music--wait, no! Just kidding! Then voila, she shows up fifty years later to explain that she abandoned her family, and that's why Richard was hallucinating and suicidal.
Okay, okay. So I'm potentially more critical of movies than I am of books. But I think that's a general trend, since New York Times book reviewers seem to be generally positive while New York Times movie reviewers are not afraid to describe films as gratuitous, confusing, or based on a screenplay with more holes than Swiss cheese.
Thursday, September 26, 2013
Monday, September 16, 2013
For there she was. Again.
Well, that's one heck of an ending.
The article I read for my panel presentation made a big deal over the fact that the title of the novel is Mrs. Dalloway rather than Clarissa, which supposedly signifies that Clarissa has thoroughly pigeonholed herself into the role of perfect hostess. Assuming that is true, what can we get out of the rather understated ending?
The last time Clarissa is referred to as Mrs. Dalloway is on page 179. From there until the end, she is Clarissa. Consider the last two sentences of the novel:
It is Clarissa, he said.
For there she was.
"For there she was.", with "she" being Clarissa. Has Clarissa, by the end of the novel, broken free from the restraints of her Mrs. Dalloway occupation? Did something momentous occur while we were slogging through Peter and Sally's conversation?
No.
Sorry for getting your hopes up like that.
As far as I can tell, Clarissa is actually a fairly stagnant character. She defies the typical definition of a "2D" character, since her personality is developed in depth and she does question the way she acts; there's just no net change in her mindset. She contemplates death and other such serious matters for a moment, but turns back to her hostess job soon afterwards. She still thinks she was right to marry Richard. She presumably still hates Miss Kilman. She's still alive and appreciating city life.
The only possible change is that she is now more sure of herself than before: she cites her marriage to Richard as the source of her happiness and appreciation for life, which would seem to validate her role as Mrs. Dalloway.
So why is it that Clarissa shows up at the end? Has Clarissa supplanted Mrs. Dalloway?
No.
Sorry for getting your hopes up like that.
I have to finally conclude that calling her "Clarissa" is actually a minor point of style necessitated by the fact that Sally and Peter are the "brain characters" for the end of the book, and they are both on a first-name basis with Clarissa. "For there she was" indicates that Clarissa is there as far as Peter is concerned--and we know how accurate other characters are with their interpretations of Clarissa. The Clarissa on the last page is not a person or identity. Instead, it is a feeling Peter gets.
It's how other people see Clarissa, not how she sees herself, that gets the last word
The article I read for my panel presentation made a big deal over the fact that the title of the novel is Mrs. Dalloway rather than Clarissa, which supposedly signifies that Clarissa has thoroughly pigeonholed herself into the role of perfect hostess. Assuming that is true, what can we get out of the rather understated ending?
The last time Clarissa is referred to as Mrs. Dalloway is on page 179. From there until the end, she is Clarissa. Consider the last two sentences of the novel:
It is Clarissa, he said.
For there she was.
"For there she was.", with "she" being Clarissa. Has Clarissa, by the end of the novel, broken free from the restraints of her Mrs. Dalloway occupation? Did something momentous occur while we were slogging through Peter and Sally's conversation?
No.
Sorry for getting your hopes up like that.
As far as I can tell, Clarissa is actually a fairly stagnant character. She defies the typical definition of a "2D" character, since her personality is developed in depth and she does question the way she acts; there's just no net change in her mindset. She contemplates death and other such serious matters for a moment, but turns back to her hostess job soon afterwards. She still thinks she was right to marry Richard. She presumably still hates Miss Kilman. She's still alive and appreciating city life.
The only possible change is that she is now more sure of herself than before: she cites her marriage to Richard as the source of her happiness and appreciation for life, which would seem to validate her role as Mrs. Dalloway.
So why is it that Clarissa shows up at the end? Has Clarissa supplanted Mrs. Dalloway?
No.
Sorry for getting your hopes up like that.
I have to finally conclude that calling her "Clarissa" is actually a minor point of style necessitated by the fact that Sally and Peter are the "brain characters" for the end of the book, and they are both on a first-name basis with Clarissa. "For there she was" indicates that Clarissa is there as far as Peter is concerned--and we know how accurate other characters are with their interpretations of Clarissa. The Clarissa on the last page is not a person or identity. Instead, it is a feeling Peter gets.
It's how other people see Clarissa, not how she sees herself, that gets the last word
Wednesday, September 11, 2013
The Highly Disorganized Post in which I Argue, Among Other Things, that Septimus is a Critique of the British Upper Class (to be Organized Later)
In Mrs. Dalloway, we are presented with two (intertwining?) stories following two characters: one who is conscious of their appearance, analyzes the world around them, and thinks their life is meaningful, and one who appears unfeeling towards the death of a close friend, finds their present constantly infiltrated by their past, feels threatened by a certain frequent visitor, and is unsure about their life.
The latter, of course, said she would buy the flowers herself.
When reading Mrs. Dalloway, perhaps the one passage that really jumped out at me was when Peter mentioned in his musings that Clarissa turned cold and reserved after her sister Sylvia was crushed by a falling tree.
...Syvlia?
Clarissa never mentioned a Sylvia.
For me, it was one of those moments where I stop reading and think, "Naholdonaminut. That completely changes how I view this character." I speculated that since Peter says that Clarissa changed after the event, it must have occurred during the time that Peter knew her--the time at Bourton that Clarissa has been obsessing over throughout her party preparations. It doesn't take much to remind her of Bourton in the first page of the book, so I presume it is not just something she's thinking about on this particular day. Yet in all of her reminiscing on the sea air and Peter and Richard and Hugh and Sally, not once does she mention someone named Sylvia who was crushed by a falling tree.
Hm...
As someone who enjoyed reading about Septimus and Rezia far more than reading about Clarissa, Peter Boring Walsh, and Hugh the Intolerable Ass (and all those other characters), I feel like they should have a purpose in the novel beyond just criticizing psychiatric medicine and making Mrs. Dalloway appreciate life. Instead, I am going to enter a conspiracy-theorist trance and say that Septimus' story is a criticism of the British upper class.
Yup.
To start off with, the novel takes place in London after World War I. The whole city is still recovering. But how much did it actually affect Clarissa? She mentions that she knows some people whose sons died in the war. But other than that, she's convinced that London is coming alive again. Clarissa's experience with WWI does not reflect what was reality for many families: young men (such as Septimus) enlisting in the nationalism-driven frenzy of war plans that revolved around taking the enemy capital before Christmas, and then getting gassed, mowed down by machine guns, blown up by shelling, or killed by any number of diseases going around. The other WWI experience we learn about (other than Septimus', of course) is that of Mr. Brewer, Septimus' employer. What did the Great War do to him?
"(...) took away his ablest young fellows, and eventually, so prying and insidious were the fingers of the European War, smashed a plaster cast of Ceres, ploughed a hole in the geranium beds, and utterly ruined the cook's nerves at Mr. Brewer's establishment at Muswell Hill." (84)
That description doesn't come from Mr. Brewer's thoughts--it's buried in a section of solid narration by Woolf. I can't see any way of interpreting the wording other than sarcastic. Prying and insidious can do a whole lot more than smash flowerbeds.
Septimus and Rezia, on the other hand, are the true face of postwar England. Septimus is mentally scarred from his experience on the battlefield; Rezia is a family member fretting over what to do with her injured loved one. Italy lost a higher percentage of its population than Britain did during WWI, so Rezia presumably faced war woes at home, though this is not depicted in the book.
Septimus and Rezia are still trying to heal the wounds of the war; Clarissa and the rest of the upper class seem to have already gotten over it. Compared to S&R, the stories of the other characters seem so... frivolous.
If you think I'm just saying this because I was bored to death by Peter Walsh ordering Bartlett pears and Hugh the Intolerable Ass acting like a jewelry connoisseur, please say so in the comments.
Clarissa saw her sister die, but doesn't seem to think about it any more. Has she forgotten how to feel? Is the "manliness" from the trenches (suppressing emotions) essentially the same thing that makes Clarissa the perfect hostess, the thing that defines the behavior of British high society? As I see it, Septimus the emotionally damaged war veteran is more sincere in his feelings and more in touch with reality than Clarissa and her fellow socialites are.
That's not to say that Woolf presents Clarissa as a superficial person. The upper-class characters are depicted with all the depth and complexity Woolf thinks is necessary in modern writing; it's just that their less significant struggles are elevated in their minds to the same level as Septimus' psychological "crime" and punishment.
...aaaand I've totally lost any sense of organization. Please excuse the mess.
The latter, of course, said she would buy the flowers herself.
When reading Mrs. Dalloway, perhaps the one passage that really jumped out at me was when Peter mentioned in his musings that Clarissa turned cold and reserved after her sister Sylvia was crushed by a falling tree.
...Syvlia?
Clarissa never mentioned a Sylvia.
For me, it was one of those moments where I stop reading and think, "Naholdonaminut. That completely changes how I view this character." I speculated that since Peter says that Clarissa changed after the event, it must have occurred during the time that Peter knew her--the time at Bourton that Clarissa has been obsessing over throughout her party preparations. It doesn't take much to remind her of Bourton in the first page of the book, so I presume it is not just something she's thinking about on this particular day. Yet in all of her reminiscing on the sea air and Peter and Richard and Hugh and Sally, not once does she mention someone named Sylvia who was crushed by a falling tree.
Hm...
As someone who enjoyed reading about Septimus and Rezia far more than reading about Clarissa, Peter Boring Walsh, and Hugh the Intolerable Ass (and all those other characters), I feel like they should have a purpose in the novel beyond just criticizing psychiatric medicine and making Mrs. Dalloway appreciate life. Instead, I am going to enter a conspiracy-theorist trance and say that Septimus' story is a criticism of the British upper class.
Yup.
To start off with, the novel takes place in London after World War I. The whole city is still recovering. But how much did it actually affect Clarissa? She mentions that she knows some people whose sons died in the war. But other than that, she's convinced that London is coming alive again. Clarissa's experience with WWI does not reflect what was reality for many families: young men (such as Septimus) enlisting in the nationalism-driven frenzy of war plans that revolved around taking the enemy capital before Christmas, and then getting gassed, mowed down by machine guns, blown up by shelling, or killed by any number of diseases going around. The other WWI experience we learn about (other than Septimus', of course) is that of Mr. Brewer, Septimus' employer. What did the Great War do to him?
"(...) took away his ablest young fellows, and eventually, so prying and insidious were the fingers of the European War, smashed a plaster cast of Ceres, ploughed a hole in the geranium beds, and utterly ruined the cook's nerves at Mr. Brewer's establishment at Muswell Hill." (84)
That description doesn't come from Mr. Brewer's thoughts--it's buried in a section of solid narration by Woolf. I can't see any way of interpreting the wording other than sarcastic. Prying and insidious can do a whole lot more than smash flowerbeds.
Septimus and Rezia, on the other hand, are the true face of postwar England. Septimus is mentally scarred from his experience on the battlefield; Rezia is a family member fretting over what to do with her injured loved one. Italy lost a higher percentage of its population than Britain did during WWI, so Rezia presumably faced war woes at home, though this is not depicted in the book.
Septimus and Rezia are still trying to heal the wounds of the war; Clarissa and the rest of the upper class seem to have already gotten over it. Compared to S&R, the stories of the other characters seem so... frivolous.
If you think I'm just saying this because I was bored to death by Peter Walsh ordering Bartlett pears and Hugh the Intolerable Ass acting like a jewelry connoisseur, please say so in the comments.
Clarissa saw her sister die, but doesn't seem to think about it any more. Has she forgotten how to feel? Is the "manliness" from the trenches (suppressing emotions) essentially the same thing that makes Clarissa the perfect hostess, the thing that defines the behavior of British high society? As I see it, Septimus the emotionally damaged war veteran is more sincere in his feelings and more in touch with reality than Clarissa and her fellow socialites are.
That's not to say that Woolf presents Clarissa as a superficial person. The upper-class characters are depicted with all the depth and complexity Woolf thinks is necessary in modern writing; it's just that their less significant struggles are elevated in their minds to the same level as Septimus' psychological "crime" and punishment.
...aaaand I've totally lost any sense of organization. Please excuse the mess.
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