Lodge, Dawid . The Het af Fohion . tondon: Penguin Beaks, 1992 Ch. 9 * The Stream of Consciousness pp 44-45 9 The Stream of Consciousness Mrs Dalloway said she would buy the flowers herself Fr Lucy had her work cut ovt for her. The daory would be taken off theie higes; Rompelmayer's men were coming. And then, ‘thought Clarissa Dallowas, what» morning fresh asi issoed to-chilren on a besch What lark! What «plunge! For so it had abways seemed to her when, with ale squeak ofthe hinges, which the could hear now abe had burst open the French windows and plonged at Bourton atthe open air How fesh how eam, slr han ‘his of course the ar was in dhe erly morning; lke dhe Map of ‘wane; the kiss ofa wave; chil nd sharp and yt (frm le of| ‘ighteen as she chen was) solemn, fein ax she did, standing ‘here a dhe open window, that something awful was about to happen; loking atthe Bowers, atthe trees with the smoke ‘ringing off them and the rooks rising, falling standing and ooking until Peter Walsh sa, “Masing mong the vegetables?” ras that i? "I prefer mento cuiflowere” wa that? He ‘rt have sai ita breast one moening when the had gone fut onto the terrace = Peter Walsh, He would be back from India one of these days, Jane or July, she forgot which, or his lemers were avfully du t was his sayings one remembered bis eye his porket-Lnfe, his smile his grumpiness and, when sills of things had wstry vanished how strange twas! {ew sayings like this about exbbages. anc WOOL? Al Dalla (1935) *‘Tu srazaw oF consciousness” was a phrate coined by Wiliam, James, pgchologst brother ofthe novelist, Hen, to characterize the continuous ow of thought and sensation inthe human ming. Later it was borrowed by Iterary eric to desribe a particular ind of modem Fsion which ried o iit his races, exempli- fied by, among others, James Joyce, Dorothy Richardon and Virgina Wool ‘The novel always was, of course, notable fr is ineirized rendering of experience. Cit ems sim (think therefore Lam) could be ts mono, though the novel's ait nudes not only reasoning but also emotions, sensation, memories and fantasies. Defoe'ssutobigraphers, and Richardson's leter-wrters, a the Degioning of the novels development a a literary form, were ‘obsessively introspective. The classic ninteenh-entury novel from Jane Austen t9 George Elot, combined he presentation of is characters as social beings witha subtle und sense analysis of ‘their moral and emotional inner Ives. Toward the tam ofthe ‘century however (ou ean seit happening in Hea Jame) realy ‘was increasingly located in the peat, subjective consciousness of individual sees, unable to communiate the fillness of their ‘experience to others. [thas been sid tha the steam-of-constous- ‘ess nov isthe Iterary expression of slipsisn, the palosophical doctrine that nothing is certainly eal except on’ own existence; ‘bu we could equally well argue tht i oflers us some rele from ‘that daunting yposhess by offering us imaginaive access tothe Ir Ives of other human beings, even if they a fins. ‘Undoubtedly ths Lind of novel tends to geneste sympathy for the chancters whose inner selves are exposed to view, however ‘ain, selish or ignobe their thoughts may occasionally be; of, to putt anather way, continuous immersion in the mind ofa wholly lunsympzhese character would be intolerable fr bath writer and reader ry Dalowsy is 4 parculaly ntresg ease in pint ‘because ts heroine also appeared a a minor character in Virginia Wools first novel, The Foage Out (191g). There 2 more tr- ional sthrial nusrave method is used to we avery sail nd prejedicial portrait of Clariea Dlloway and ber oband, 38 snobbish and reactionary members of the Brkish upper class. °Here, for instance, is Mes Dalloway in her eae incamason epsrng wo be introduced to 2 scholar called Ambrose and his le ‘Mes Dallowa, with her bead «ie on one sie i he beso reoleet Ambrose = wast mame’ = but fed She mt ‘male slighty uneasy by what sbe had heard. Sbe knew dt ‘chore maid amone~ pe they met ia fares oe Fale aries or ile soburan women who sid iapeeay. “Of xrseUinow is my husband you want, ot me But Helen fame in at pol, and Ms Dalloway saw with relief cht ‘hough gh eceni in apearance, she was tui hed If well and ber voice ad enum wich she Bld be the sgn of dy We are shown what Mes Dallowsy is thinking, but the st in Which her thoughts are repo puts them and her at an ii Aisance, and pases len Judgment on them. Tete i evidence ‘hat when Vigna Wolf bean weg about this character agin, ‘twas originally with the same quas-sacal intention; but by that ‘ime she had become commie to the steam-of-conscioushess rove, and the method inviably Ted her into = much move Sympathee port of Clara Dallovay "There are wo spl echniques fr representing consciousness Jn prose tin. One interior monologue, in which the gramma ‘el subject ofthe discourses an", and we, sit were, overhear the character verbal iso her thoughts a they occu {shall discus this method in the next secon. The other method ciled fhe indirect syle, goes back alas as fra Jane Austen, but was employed with ever-increasing scope and viosiy by modem ‘novels ike Woul It ender thought as repaned speech the ‘hid person, past ens) but keps to the Lind of vocabulary tat is appropriate fo the character, and deletes some ofthe tags, ike “she though.” “she wondered,” “she asked herself” et. that amore formal maraive sple would require. This gives the ison of insite access toa characte’ mind, but without tuly suren- ‘ering author parcipatn in the discourse "Mrs Dalloway sud she would buy the lowers herself" isthe 6first sentence ofthe novel the statement of an ahora narrator, butan impersonal and inscratable one, who docs ot explain who [Mrs Dallony is or why she needed to buy Sowers. This abrupt plunging ofthe reader into the middle of an eagoing fe (ve fradualy piece gether the heroine's biography by a process of Inference ype the presentation of consciousness sa "sueam ‘The nest sentence, “For Lacy had her work cat out for her.* rover the focus of the narrative ino the chancter's mind by Mein. free indirect sle, omining an inusve autora tag, uch a8 “Mrs Dalloway reflected refering tothe maid family by her frst name, a8 Mrs Dalloway here woud, ot by her faction; and sing & casual, colloquial expression, “cutout for her, that belongs to Mrs Dallony's own se of speech. The third sentence has the same form. The fourth mvs back slightly towards an authoral manner to inform of the heraine’s fall ‘ame, aswell as her pleasure inthe fine summer morning: “And then, thug Clarina Dallomay, what a morning es as isued to hldren ona beach” (ais mine) ‘The ejacolatons, “What ark! What plunge!” hat flo lok superficially ike interior monologue, but they are nat the mature heroine's responses tothe morning in Westminster a she goes out to buy ower. She is remembering herself atthe age of eighteen remembering herself as 2 child. Or, © put it nother way, the Image “fresh a if issued to children on a beach, evoked by the Westminster morning, reminds her of how simile metaphor, of children rkng inthe es, woud come to mind she “plunged” lato the fea, calm ar of + summer momig, “ike the Map of « ‘wate; the List of wave” at Bourton (some eauntry house, we pesume), where she would meet someane called Peter Walsh he first hint of anything like ator). The actual and the metaphorical, scaly, Claris Dalloway cannot sivays trust her ‘memory "Musing among the vegetables" ~ was tat "I prefer ‘en to califlowers = was that” "Meandering the sentences may be, but they ar, apart frm the eence office indirect se, well-formed and early cadencedVirginia Woolf has smuggled some of er own lial eloquence Imo Mes Dalloway’s steam of consciousness without it being obvious. Transpose these sentences into the fist person and they ‘would sound fa to lterar and considered to pas for a wansrip= tion of someone's random thoughts They woud sound indeed Uke ‘ing in a athe precious syle of auaographical reminiscence: se a ed se neem Shuster irene piers fae ac ce rinsiren sarc renee Eeglonn Wi Siggien Rise tae MSTraE desea tee eas sepa to Sedat Sarge ohyoinaatber ‘The imerie monologues of Virginia Woolf's later novel, The Wes ar fom ach ail ym Janes Jogo 4 more resoucefl exponent ofthat way of rendering the stream ‘of consciousness. 4s