The Image

It is this, he said, as he entered Dean’s Yard. Big Ben was beginning to strike, first the warning, musical; then the hour, irrevocable. Lunch parties waste the entire afternoon, he thought, approaching his door.

Big ben was a major symbol in Mrs. Dalloway. The presence of a constant reminder of time made me think in terms of old or classic. I came across this picture and found it interesting. The outdated black and white contrasted with the vibrant now. While the timeframe of the story was limited to a day, time flowed from when the war was still taking place. Did Septimus feel as if he was seeing this picture?: the black and white, dreary aspects of the war and the bright, colorful dresses worn to dinner parties. Through the indirect discourse, I saw pauses in time just as these cars are stopped in a past that is the present. “Big Ben striking the half-hour”: Big Ben is personified by the action of violently striking, as if he were going to ambush the lives in the story. Personifying Big Ben and giving it the actions creates a tone of there being an omniscient eye. This then brought me to the thought of the eyes of Doctor T.J. Eckleburg; the grotesque and desolate eyes. Was Big Ben also grotesque or was it a source of reality for the characters? Is there something in our lives that can be equated to Big Ben?