By: Mariana Gurevich

“What a small world,” people remark after we begin speaking and find that we have many mutual friends. It is not unusual to talk someone and realize that they know someone who you do, for in some way we are all connected. In Mrs. Dalloway by Virginia Woolf, we are presented with a connectedness between characters of a more subtle, yet similar variety. Although Clarissa and Septimus never meet, they reflect each other through their thoughts and actions. They are two characters who are confounded by society, though for different reasons. Clarissa is quite sickly and spends a lot of time reflecting on the world. She is pensive and meditative, absorbed in her own world of thoughts wherever she goes. Septimus, although not a friend of Clarissa’s, is similar to her in his way of thinking. He is a war veteran who suffers from shell shock, which means that he experiences intrusive thoughts or memories from fighting that don’t allow him to function normally. Similar to Clarissa, he struggles to find the good and happiness in society. In certain respects, Septimus is a more assured, resolved version of Clarissa; While Clarissa questions the world, Septimus has already experienced what he believes to be the worst of all evils and ultimately takes the plunge to his death for he sees no reason to continue living in this cruel world.

From the moment we are first introduced to Clarissa, we find her questioning her life. She wonders if she made the right decision by marrying Richard, and we observe as flashbacks consume her being. She wonders what life would be like if she married her young love, Peter, “Suddenly it would cover over her, If he were with me now what would he say?” (7). Although it is interesting to follow Clarissa’s story as a reader, it is agonizing to watch her stress over all the details of life. What is true love? What does it mean to live? Why is the sky blue? Clarissa thinks and thinks, as we painstakingly try to follow her thought process. It thus becomes evident that this woman is not entirely healthy or content with her life and one cannot help but sympathize with her. We follow her as she prepares to throw a party, only to find her remark, “It was too much of an effort. She was not enjoying it” (166). Even this party is like an out of body experience for our narrator, and there is little that brings her true joy.

Upon meeting Septimus we realize that, similar to Clarissa, he is not really living. He is a paranoid man, consumed by thoughts about the evil in the world around him. His marriage is not a happy one any longer, for as his wife remarks as she steps away from him at the park, “having left Septimus, who wasn’t Septimus any longer” (64). Septimus had great friends killed in the war, and he cannot stop suffering, now that the war is over. Unlike Clarissa who questions, he is more assured in his thoughts convinced that the world is evil, that he knows everyone’s thoughts and that he knows the meaning of the world. Due to the bombardment of all these negative thoughts and moments in his head, Septimus cries often.  Although part of the world, Septimus is clearly not quite present.

Due to the similarities in their mannerisms and thoughts, we realize the interconnectivity between Clarissa and Septimus.  Both of these characters are absorbed in their thoughts, Clarissa’s mind bombarded with questions, while Septimus’ head is full of wicked answers.  Interestingly, we realize that these two protagonists are bringing these miserable existences upon themselves, for we, as outsiders looking in, know that they can change their mindsets if they really tried. “But Septimus let himself think about horrible things, as she could too, if she tried” Lucrezia Warren Smith, Septimus’ wife remarks (65). Thus, we realize that these two characters are plagued with sickly existences, for they cannot seem to turn these bad thoughts off. We witness though that Septimus’ is quite resolved in his choice to die because he finds this alternative much more comforting, as compared to living in this cruel world. Meanwhile, from the beginning of the novel, we know that Clarissa is scared of many things, including the outside world and death. Therefore, even though she questions, she is not a direct parallel of Septimus because he is already assured in his take on the world. Upon learning about Septimus’ death at her party, Clarissa comes to an important realization, “She felt somehow very like him- the young man who had killed himself. She felt glad that he had done it; thrown it away…He made her feel the beauty; made her feel the fun” (182). In this manner, Clarissa and Septimus are not quite reflections of each other, but rather Septimus’ character represents one of the choices that Clarissa could have taken, if she did not snap out of her overly pensive behavior; in an odd way, Septimus’ death brings peace to Clarissa.

“I think therefore I am.”

There are countless questions we contemplate on a daily basis. Why am I doing this? What is love? What’s for dinner?  These inquiries, although ranging in scope and seriousness, are proof that we think and wonder, but does that truly define existence? In The Discourse on Method, Descartes explores what it actually means to be alive. He thinks about his physical body, his thoughts, his dreams, and concludes that “I think therefore I am.” It is interesting to consider what it really means to live, and what defines existing in particular. I find Descartes’ piece of writing quite unique and enticing because it is laced with contradictions, yet these don’t interfere with my comprehension of the piece, but rather encourage me to think deeper. For instance, on the one hand Descartes is contemplating faith and the existence of a higher power, while on the other he is more assuredly stating that God, as a higher being, created us and gave us the ability to think. It is fascinating to watch the narrator’s contradictory dialogue go on as he grapples with what it means to human.

I have never particularly concentrated on the question of what makes us living, or what makes us human. Therefore, to see Descartes devote so much thought and writing to this inquiry seemed silly at first, but the piece is definitely not light-hearted or comical. It’s a serious dialogue within a person, which makes the writing that much more powerful. Since he is writing about how we think as a race and what it means that we are humans with thoughts, it makes sense to read paragraph upon paragraph of a person trying to handle and comprehend the things on his mind. “I observed that while I thus desired everything to be false, I, who thought, must of necessity be something,” Descartes concludes, for if everything around him is not definite, at least his own being must be definite, since he is thinking. Therefore, arises the statement, “I think therefore I am.” Although I do see the logic that he followed in arriving at this conclusion, I am still skeptical about its exclusivity, specifically pertaining to other things around us. Is the only way to prove something’s existence by showing it has thoughts, or is it through my own thoughts that I give life to concepts around me?

Although I come away from The Discourse on Method with plenty of questions, in some sense Descartes has done his job. “Reflecting upon the fact that I doubted, and that in consequence my being was not quite perfect (for I saw clearly that to know was a greater perfection than to doubt),” Descartes states, as he concludes that there are many things we humans do not know, therefore there must be a perfect being, God, who created us all. I find this ending impactful in many ways. Descartes tactfully leads us to the notion of a perfect greater power who created us all, yet also emphasizes that there is little any of us know definitively. This once more drives home the concept of existing simply because we think, since there are countless ideas, tangible and intangible, which we each contemplate on a daily basis. I come away from this piece puzzled, and that is not a bad thing, for in this way I know I am human.

Source:

Puchner, Martin, Suzanne Conklin. Akbari, Wiebke Denecke, and Barbara Fuchs. “From The Discourse on Method.” The Norton Anthology of Western Literature. New York: W.W. Norton, 2014. p. 22-25. Print.