ENGL 3653: English Literature II

John M. Mercer, Professor of English

Northeastern State University, Broken Arrow, Oklahoma

Study Guide 13: Woolf, Joyce, Lawrence

Revised 4-22-09

 

                                                                       “Fiction”

Important characteristics of 20th-century fiction include

 

Virginia Woolf

  1. In what ways did Woolf lead a privileged life?
  2. In what ways did Woolf lead a tortured life?
  3. What narrative technique is Woolf known for using?  In what genre?
  4. Woolf is best known for her writing in what genre?
  5. Extra-credit movie: Although I haven’t seen it, I think the fairly recent film The Hours is based on Woolf’s novel Mrs. Dalloway.  Whether you’ve already seen it or watch it now for the first time, you could respond to this film (and relate it to our study of Woolf and 20th-century fiction) for extra credit. 

 

Woolf’s Nonfiction Prose

By genre the two assigned works by Woolf are nonfiction prose, or, more specifically, personal essays (also called informal essays or familiar essays).

  1. What personal (or informal or familiar) essays from the Romantic Period did we study?
  2. What works of nonfiction prose from the Victorian Period did we study?  (These kinds of comparisons among works of different periods will be important on the objective section of the final comprehensive exam.)
  3. Going all the way back to the creator of the genre, the 16th-century French essayist Montaigne, personal essays tend to have a loose (or somewhat rambling) organization.  What does this mean?  Is this true of the two assigned essays by Woolf?
  4. Personal essays are often written in the first-person point of view and convey the personal voice of the writer (as opposed to that of a fictional narrator).  Is this true of the two assigned essays by Woolf?  What evidence is there that Woolf is speaking in her own voice in these two essays?

 

A Room of One’s Own

  1. What subject does Woolf say she went to the library to research?  What does Woolf mean by “the time of Elizabeth”?  What years is she referring to?
  2. What were the results of Woolf’s research?  What information was available?  What information was not available?  How might the results of her research be different today?
  3. Why does Woolf make up a completely fictional story about a hypothetical sister of Shakespeare?  What are the main events in this story?  In other words, what, according to Woolf, would have happened if Shakespeare had had a gifted sister?
  4. What does the death of Shakespeare=s hypothetical sister have in common with Woolf’s own death?  (See the textbook’s introduction to Woolf’s life.)
  5. Extra-credit research:  Did Shakespeare actually have any sisters?  What do we know about them?
  6. According to Woolf, why could no woman in Shakespeare’s time have written the plays of Shakespeare?
  7. For the required reading, you may stop in the middle of page 2118 (rather than at the top of 2122).  Then read page 2151(m)-52(t), the conclusion of A Room of One’s Own.  In this conclusion, what challenge for the future does Woolf offer?
  8. What is the significance of the title A Room of One’s Own?
  9. Extra-credit video: From library reserve, watch the PBS Masterpiece Theatre production of A Room of One’s Own, which features an actress playing the role of Virginia Woolf presenting part of this essay as a public lecture.  According to the production’s introduction, how is the actress’s performance different from Woolf’s own public persona?

 

“Professions for Women”

  1. Under what circumstances was this work originally presented?  To what audience?
  2. Woolf makes what Aristotle calls ethical appeals to her audience by admitting what a relatively easy time she has had in her profession as a writer.  What advantage relates to the nature of the profession of writing?  What advantage relates to Woolf’s own family circumstances?
  3. Next, Woolf discusses two different obstacles she has faced as a writer.  What are these two obstacles?  How has each hindered Woolf’s writing?    
  4. With what challenge for the future does Woolf conclude?  What is her attitude toward the future?
  5. What is the purpose of this speech?  Do you think Woolf is successful in fulfilling her purpose with the original audience?
  6. In what ways does Woolf use the two other kinds of appeals Aristotle identifies, logical appeals and emotional appeals?  (Not covered in textbook; will be discussed in class.)  
  7. How is the subject matter of this essay similar to that of A Room of One’s Own?

 

James Joyce

  1. In what city did Joyce grow up?  What city is the setting for all of Joyce’s works?
  2. When did Joyce leave Ireland?  Why?  Where did he live for most of his adult life?
  3. In Joyce’s later works, after Dubliners, his writing becomes highly experimental (and difficult to read).
    1. What experimental point of view (narration) does he use?  What are the characteristics of this point of view?
    2. In what ways does he experiment with language?
  4. What is the genre of Ulysses?  What is its subject matter?  Why does Joyce use this title?
  5. In your textbook, read the first paragraph of Ulysses (2200) and, if you wish, glance at additional paragraphs.  What are your reactions?  What generalizations can you make about the style of the work?  
  6. What is the genre of Finnegans Wake?  What is its subject matter?  What does the title mean?
  7. Read the first page of Finnegans Wake that is in your textbook (2239b-40) and, if you wish, glance at additional pages.  What are your reactions?  What generalizations can you make about the style of the work?  

 

Joyce’s Dubliners

Dubliners, written early in Joyce’s career, is a collection of 15 short stories (sometimes called short “sketches” rather than short stories because they have little plot, focusing instead on character).  Each story shows the isolation and eventual disappointment, or “failure of self-realization,” of a central character who lives in Dublin.  Joyce skillfully uses precise physical description of the setting to create mood and symbolism.

 

“Araby”

  1. Which point of view is used to tell this story?  Who is the narrator?  What do we know about the narrator?
  2. What details of setting are given at the beginning of the story?  What is the significance of these details?  What mood or atmosphere do they create?  Are any aspects of the setting symbolic?
  3. What is Araby?  Why does the narrator want to go to Araby?
  4. What obstacles (conflicts) does the narrator face as he tries to fulfill his goal?
    1. What obstacles does he face at home before he goes to Araby?  What does the narrator mean when he says, concerning his uncle’s arrival at home, “I could interpret these signs”?  What signs?  What do these signs indicate to the narrator?
    2. What obstacles does he face after he arrives at Araby? 
  5. What is the climax of the story, the moment of greatest interest for the reader?
  6. What is the resolution of the plot?  In other words, what happens at the end of the story?
  7. It has been said that in Dubliners Joyce depicts Dublin as “the center of paralysis.”  How does this description fit the plight of the narrator of this story?

 

 

“The Dead”

Although “The Dead” was not originally part of Joyce’s plan for Dubliners, it is the last and by far the longest story in the collection. The “dead” people referred to in the title and in the last sentence of the story are, in a sense, the spiritually dead Dubliners of all the other stories in the collection.   

  1. The setting for the story is an annual holiday party held on the Feast of the Epiphany (January  6), or sometime not long after New Year’s.  What details in the story establish that this is indeed the setting?
  2. What is the point of view of this story?  Who is the narrator, and what kind of information does the narrator reveal?
  3. Gabriel, the main character, suffers a series of setbacks on the evening of the party.
    1. Who is Lily?  What does Gabriel say that embarrasses Lily?  What does Gabriel give Lily that embarrasses her?  
    2. In talking to Gabriel’s aunts, how does Gabriel’s wife, Gretta, make fun of Gabriel?  What do Gretta’s comments suggest about Gabriel’s character?
    3. What causes Gabriel to remember his mother’s attitude toward Gretta before he married her?  What was her attitude?  How does he feel now about this conflict with his mother?
    4. What is Gabriel’s nagging worry throughout the evening?  Why?
    5. In what specific ways does Miss Ivors criticize Gabriel?  What is the general accusation she makes against him?  How does he feel about this conversation?
    6. Taking all of the above incidents together, how would you describe Gabriel’s character?  What hinders his happiness and his relationships with others?
  4. After Miss Ivors leaves the party, what successes does Gabriel experience?
  5. What does Gabriel say in his speech?  How sincere is he?  How is the speech received by his audience?  What does Gabriel seem to think of his speech?  What do you think of it?
  6. At what might be identified as the crisis or turning point of the story, when he is about to leave the party, Gabriel looks up and sees his wife.  How does she look different to him?  How does he feel toward her?   
  7. What is Gabriel thinking about on the carriage ride to the hotel?  What is Gretta thinking about?
  8. What is the climax or moment of greatest interest for the reader of the story?
  9. Answer these questions about Gabriel’s epiphany or moment of recognition.
    1. What causes Gabriel to experience this epiphany?  Who is Michael Furey?  What story does Gretta tell about him?
    2. Specifically where in the story is Gabriel’s epiphany stated? 
    3. In your own words, what does Gabriel realize about himself? 
    4. What universal insight does he gain about the world and everyone in it (see the last paragraph and a half)?  What is the literal meaning of the weather report that “snow was general all over Ireland”?  Symbolically, what does “snow” represent here?
  10. The title “The Dead” relates to many of the characters and others referred to in the story.
    1. What people discussed in the story are already deceased?  Do you see any similarities between Gabriel and his grandfather Patrick Morkan, about whom Gabriel tells a story?
    2. Which character is said to be dying or at least not far from death?  Which characters are elderly?
    3. Which characters could be classified as the living dead (going through the motions of life without being fully alive)? 

(1)   Whom is Gabriel asked to keep an eye on during the party?  Why? What is “the pledge”? 

(2)   At the end of the story, does Gabriel consider himself to be one of the living dead?

    1. What negative judgments does Gabriel (in his thoughts) make about his aunts and his niece?  Are these judgments supported by the story as a whole?  Should these women be classified among the living dead?
    2. What is meant by the line “One by one they were all becoming shades”?  What is a “shade” in this context?
  1. In addition, the story contains many references to and/or symbols of death.
    1. What description is given of the aunts’ house?
    2. What scenes from Shakespeare’s plays are illustrated by prints on the walls?
    3. What song does Aunt Julia sing?  What is ironic about her singing this song?  What image of death does her singing this song suggest to Gabriel?
    4. What practice of Trappist monks is discussed at the dinner table? 
    5. What song does Gretta hear Mr. D’Arcy sing?
    6. What story does Gretta tell Gabriel about Michael Furey?
    7. While the party is going on, what connotations does the snow have for Gabriel?  At the end of the story, what connotations does the snow have (for example, in the last paragraph)?
  2. Gabriel’s name is symbolic.  In the Bible and in Christian tradition, what do the names “Gabriel” and “Michael” have in common?  At the end of time, according to tradition, what service will Gabriel perform for those who have died?

 

D. H. Lawrence

  1. How were Lawrence=s father and mother different from each other?  How did this difference affect Lawrence?
  2. In his writing, with what human relationship was Lawrence most concerned?

 

“The Horse Dealer=s Daughter”

  1. What is the point of view of this story—first person, omniscient, limited omniscient, or objective/dramatic?  How can you tell?  Why does Lawrence use this point of view?
  2. What event has precipitated a crisis for the members of the Pervin family?  Why?
  3. Critics have pointed out that, living without love, the Pervin siblings have devolved from human to animal.  In what specific ways does the story compare the Pervins to animals?  What is the significance of the title of the story?
  4. In what ways is Dr. Jack Ferguson, like Mabel and her brothers, in need of a new life? 
  5. How is Mabel like Cinderella?
  6. What is the last thing Mabel does before going to the pond?  What is the significance of this act?
  7. Before Mabel goes into the pond, what two encounters does she have with Jack?  What happens on these occasions?  What is the nature of their relationship?  Is there any indication of a subconscious attraction between the two?  
  8. Why does Mabel walk into the pond?  Why does Jack go into the pond?
  9. Many critics have commented that Mabel and Jack’s experience is comparable to baptism.
    1. How is Mabel’s immersion in the pond like a baptism?
    2. Who is the agent of Mabel’s “rebirth” or “resurrection from the dead”?  What is especially surprising about her being saved by him?  
    3. In what sense are both Mabel and Jack reborn?
    4. What specific language in the story relates to baptism and rebirth?  (For example, in what context is the phrase “rose again” used?)
    5. Lawrence’s writing in general does not reflect belief in Christianity.  Why, then, would he use the symbolism of baptism?
    6. Lawrence’s alternative title for this story is “The Miracle.”  How is this title appropriate?
  10. Jack’s undressing of Mabel can be interpreted on different levels.
    1. Why does he undress her?
    2. When Mabel regains consciousness, what assumption does she make about his having undressed her?
    3. On the symbolic level of baptism and rebirth, how is her nudity appropriate?
  11. Both Mabel and Jack are somewhat ambivalent about their new relationship.
    1. In what ways does Mabel vacillate between love (faith) and doubt after she awakens?
    2. Why is Jack reluctant to accept Mabel’s advances?  Why does he ultimately accept them?
    3. What is the significance of the dank, disgusting smell of wet clothing?
    4. How does the theme of this story relate to that of Eliot’s “The Journey of the Magi”?
  12. Although you may see Mabel and Jack’s relationship as hasty, ill-advised, and even bizarre, it clearly reflects Lawrence’s philosophy of love. Does Lawrence see love as rational or irrational?  conscious or subconscious?  moderate or overpowering?   purely spiritual or involving the physical? 

 

“The Horse-Dealer’s Daughter” as a Typical Lawrence Story

In class we will discuss how “The Horse-Dealer’s Daughter” is typical of Lawrence’s fiction in its