20C Authors

major writers, biographical notes, and literary criticism

major writers, biographical notes, and literary criticism

Mikhail Bulgakov web links

September 17, 2009 by Roy Johnson

Mikhail Bulgakov at Mantex
Biography, study notes, and web links

The Master and Margarita
Stylish web site in English, Dutch, French, and Russian featuring all aspects of the novel, its themes and interpretation – plus multimedia links, including even pop video clips

Bulgakov’s The Master and Margarita
Web study featuring illustrations, maps, characters, themes, bibliography, and chapter notes with introductory essay and notes

Mikhail Afanasjevitch Bulgakov
Works, timeline, excerpts, links – in English, Russian & German

Bulgakov on Wikipedia
Life history, historical background, works, materials, and links

BBC Bulgakov Wiki
Biographical notes

Library of Congress Bibliography
Extensive records of biography, works, criticism, and commentary

The Heart of a Dog (1925) A rich, successful Moscow professor befriends a stray dog and attempts a scientific experiment by transplanting into it the testicles and pituitary gland of a recently deceased man. A distinctly worryingly human animal is then turned on the loose, and the professor’s hitherto respectable life becomes a nightmare beyond endurance. An absurd and superbly comic story, this classic novel can also be read as a fierce parable of the Russian Revolution.

A Country Doctor’s Notebook (1925) With the ink still wet on his diploma, the twenty-five year old Dr Mikhail Bulgakov was flung into the depths of rural Russia which, in 1916-17, was still largely unaffected by such novelties as the motor car, the telephone or electric light. How his alter-ego copes (and fails to cope) with the new and often appalling responsibilities of a lone practitioner in a vast country practice – in blizzards, pursued by wolves and on the eve of Revolution – is described in Bulgakov’s delightful blend of candid realism and imaginative exuberance.

The Fatal Eggs (1924) Professor Persikov discovers a new form of light ray whose effect is to accelerate growth in primitive organisms. But when this ray is shone on the wrong batch of eggs, the Professor finds himself both the unwilling creator of giant hybrids, and the focus of a merciless press campaign. For it seems the propaganda machine has turned its gaze on him, distorting his nature in the very way his ‘innocent’ tampering created the monster snakes and crocodiles that now terrorise the neighbourhood. An inspired work of science fiction and a biting political allegory.

The Master and Margarita (1940/1973) is a wonderful mixture of realism and fantasy which offers a satirical view of communist Russia. The story involves the arrival of the Devil into Moscow, interspersed with chapters dealing with Pontius Pilate and the crucifixion of Jesus Christ, plus other sections related to an artist and his relationships with his art and his lover. All three layers of the story are blended with spellbinding imaginative force.

The novel is a multilayered critique of the Soviet society in general and its literary establishment specifically. It begins with Satan visiting Moscow in 1935, joining a conversation of a critic and a poet, busily debating the existence of Jesus Christ and the Devil. It then evolves into a whole scale indictment of the corruption, greed, narrow-mindedness, and widespread paranoia of Stalinist Russia. Banned but widely read, the novel firmly secured Bulgakov’s place among the pantheon of the greatest of Russian writers.

Black Snow: A Theatrical Novel (1920s) When Maxudov’s bid to take his own life fails, he dramatises the novel whose failure provoked the suicide attempt. To the resentment of literary Moscow, his play is accepted by the legendary Independent Theatre and he plunges into a vortex of inflated egos. With each rehearsal more sparks fly and the chances of the play being performed recede. This is a back-stage novel and a brilliant satire on his ten-year love-hate relationship with Stanislavsky and the Moscow Arts Theatre

More Die of Heartbreak

May 30, 2017 by Roy Johnson

tutorial, commentary, study resources, and web links

More Die of Heartbreak (1987) comes in the middle of Saul Bellow’s mature period as a novelist. He had won the Nobel Prize for Literature in the previous decade, and obviously felt confident as the chronicler of modern American society. However, he continued to keep alive the folk memories of his heritage as the son of Jewish immigrants and his connections with European society from which his grandparents had emigrated.

The novel features many of his characteristic tropes and character types – corrupt lawyers, businessmen, and politicians; the violence of modern urban centres; rapacious females; and the dominance of the metropolitan city in contemporary American life.

More Die of Heartbreak – commentary

Saul Bellow’s novels very often feature a central character who is trying to make sense of the world in which he lives. These protagonists can be slightly tragic figures such as Tommy Wilhelm in the novella Seize the Day (1956) or the comic Moses Herzog who writes letters to dead philosophers in Herzog (1964).

Frequently the central character or narrator will be presenting a second larger-than-life character who is being held up as a role model of some kind. Humboldt’s Gift (1975) is narrated by Charlie Citrine, but it is the figure of his friend Humbolt Fleischer who provides a great deal of the novel’s amusement and interest. Bellow does the same thing: in Ravelstein (2000) where the narrator Chick is searching for meaning, but the novel is dominated by the portrait of his colleague Abe Ravelstein.

More Die of Heartbreak follows the same pattern – but in surprisingly muted tones. Neither the narrator Kenneth Trachtenberg nor his uncle Benn Crader are large scale comic figures, and they are beset by no more serious problems than entanglements with the opposite sex.

Benn Crader is supposed to be a world-class botanist – but this characterisation is never fully persuasive, just as Kenneth Trachtenberg’s role as a professor of Russian literature is not convincingly realised. We simply do not see these characters at work sufficiently to give them full fictional credibility. Moreover, there is never sufficiently persuasive evidence provided for Ken’s obsessive interest in his older uncle’s welfare.

The main theme

Kenneth is surrounded by conflicting influences and role models. His father is a successful playboy, and his mother has turned herself into a Saint Theresa missionary figure in response. Ken admires his uncle Benn, and he has other relatives who include a corrupt politician who has swindled his own family.

Ken sustains himself in this social maelstrom by his belief in the humanising influence of his academic discipline – Russian literature. He also employs what is now called cultural history as a lodestone as he finds himself dragged into more and more complex entanglements generated by modern American life.

There is also a surprisingly understated element of his being trapped between the position of an insider and outsider. He is from a Jewish immigrant family, but was born and raised in France. He keeps modern European history firmly in mind – the Russian revolution, the Nazi death camps – as he tries to steer his uncle Benn through American waters infested by legal sharks and property speculators. All of this will be familiar territory to those acquainted with Bellow’s other major novels.

The secondary theme

However, a secondary or sub-theme emerges from just about every part of the novel’s events – and that is a surprisingly explicit interest in sexuality. It should also be said that although it is articulated via Ken as the narrator, this almost obsessive interest must be attributed to Saul Bellow. He depicts a world shot through with an almost obsessional interest in sexuality at every level.

This begins with the slightly unpleasant and barely credible interest Ken takes in his uncle Benn’s sex life following the breakdown of his marriage. The idea of two adult males from different generations sharing erotic technique tips is as aesthetically toe-curling as it is improbable.

Ken also gives full accounts of his father’s adulterous sexual activities – which are not only successful, but are endorsed by Ken and tolerated by his wife. Ken himself is involved with Trekkie, a young woman whom he suspects of being engaged in sado-masochistic practices with other men which leave her with bruises on her legs.

Benn is being vigorously pursued by the rapacious cougar Caroline Bunge, who spices up her sexual attractions with pornographic videos and drugs. And when Benn courteously changes a light bulb for a lonely neighbour, she pursues him saying “What am I supposed to do with my sexuality?”

When Ken and Benn make a sudden trip to Japan, the outstanding element of the visit is not Benn’s lectures on plant biology but a visit to a strip club which culminates in two girls displaying their vaginas to the crowd. Later, when Benn meets his prospective father-in-law Doctor Layamon, the gynaecologist’s principal topic of interest is the sexual relationship Benn has with his daughter Matilda.

Every one of these incidents can be justified on grounds of narrative relevance and the context of post sexual revolution writing in the 1980s. But responsibility for their volume and insistence lies clearly at Saul Bellow’s own door. It leaves behind a slightly unpleasant impression.

It is not easy to take seriously a concern for the victims of Stalin’s show trials and Hitler’s death camps, with a prurient interest in the bedroom positions and practices of a middle-aged couple during copulation. But it seems that these contrasting or even contradictory issues are precisely what Saul Bellow wishes to present as the challenge of modern consciousness.

The Flight from Woman

The other side of this coin of sexual obsession is the theme of escaping from the clutches of rapacious women. At the start of the novel Ken is in flight from Trekkie – a woman to whom he is sexually attracted but regards as perverse, since she seems to be engaged in sado-masochistic behaviour with other lower-class men.

Uncle Benn on the other hand is being pursued by Caroline Bunge, from whom he escapes on the very day they are due to be married. He then falls into the clutches of the ambitious Matilda Layamon, who is part of a rich and successful family. However, they wish to use Benn as a status-gainer on their social circuit. Benn marries Matilda – but shortly afterwards escapes from her and flies off to the ‘North pole’ to join a research project.

The logic of the narrative is that women are attractive and desirable as sexual partners, but that socially they are demanding, expensive, and uncontrollable. It is significant that Ken finds his only relaxing connection with Dita Schwartz, who has been virtually de-sexualised as a result of a horrendous dermatological operation on her face.

The setting

It is quite clear from the incidental details that the novel is set imaginatively in Chicago. Yet Bellow for some reason avoids a specific location for the events of the narrative. The main focus of attention is on the fictional ‘Radio Tower’ – which is fairly obviously the mammoth Willis Tower in Chicago

Straight ahead of us stood the Electronic Tower, with its twin masts like the horns of a Viking helmet – it was very nearly as tall as the Sears building in Chicago.

This is something of a literary joke, because the giant Willis Tower in Chicago is commonly referred to as the Sears Tower. But why should Bellow adopt this sleight of hand? Maybe because in other parts of the novel he is exposing all sorts of corrupt practices in the legal and political life of what is obviously Chicago. He gives himself a certain protection by the creation of a fictional city – which is never named.

The conclusion

Saul Bellow’s novels are unusual in that their narratives rarely culminate in a dramatic finale or even a resolution to the conflicts they have been exploring. More Die of Heartbreak concludes with Benn Crader running away from his unsuitable wife to pursue his scientific interests in a remote place. The narrator Kenneth Trachtenberg remains where he was at the beginning of the novel – a teacher of Russian literature who might have occasional custody of his daughter.

They both seem to have undergone a certain amount of erotic-based heartache, and they have theorised about their attitudes to women ad nauseam. There is a sense in which Bellow’s novels do not offer dramatic narratives: they explore states of mind and a portfolio of contemporary beliefs. Nor do they offer any comforting certainties or resolutions: there is very little sense of closure here.

More Die of Heartbreak – study resources

More Die of Heartbreak – Penguin Classics – Amazon UK

More Die of Heartbreak – Penguin Classics – Amazon US

More Die of Heartbreak – Library of America – Amazon UK

More Die of Heartbreak – Library of America – Amazon US

Saul Bellow – Collected Stories – Penguin Classics – Amazon UK

Saul; Bellow – Collected Stories – Penguin Classics – Amazon US

Saul Bellow (Modern Critical Views) – essays and studies – Amz UK

Saul Bellow (Modern Critical Views) – essays and studies – Amz US

Cambridge Companion to Saul Bellow – Amazon UK

More Die of Heartbreak – synopsis

Young professor of Russian literature Kenneth Trachtenberg gives an account of his uncle Benn Crader, a Jewish botanist who has recently become divorced. Ken also describes his ambivalent relationship with his womanising father Rudi, who is disappointed with his son’s lack of ambition and panache.

Ken’s relative Harold Vilitzer is a crooked politician who has defrauded his own family, yet Benn still feels an affection for him. Ken wonders why his uncle has chosen botany as a vocation, and he tries to generate a coherent understanding of life from his disparate collection of relatives.

Ken has problems with his partner Trekkie, who refuses to marry him, lives like a student even though she has money, and has a taste for sexual masochism. Benn is being pursued by Caroline Burge, a rich and fast-living vamp with a taste for drugs and celebrities. Ken and Benn take a holiday in Japan to escape from these problems on the day Benn is due to get married.

Ken has visited his mother who is working in a Somalian refugee camp. She too is disappointed in her son. He talks to her about the Gulag archipelago and Russia’s talent for suffering. In Kyoto Benn finds a visit to a strip club rather upsetting.

Without telling Ken during his absence, Benn marries Matilda Layamon, a rich young woman with a celebrity doctor father. Ken disapproves of his choice and is severely critical of the Layamons’ vulgar ostentation. Benn moves into the Layamons’ appartments, and Matilda is revealed as a spoiled and ambitious dilettante socialite. Doctor Layamon’s wealth is founded on dubious favours from his rich clients.

Benn and Matilda look over the enormous apartment she has inherited. Layamon takes Benn to an expensive lunch where he reveals that he has had Benn investigated by a private detective. He also wants Benn to recover the money Vilitzer owes him to pay for the refurbishment of the old apartment.

Ken pumps the seedy entrepreneur Fishl Vilitzer for information about his father. and judge Amador Chetnick. Fishl wants to act on Benn’s behalf in an effort to retrieve the money he lost in the rigged court case. Fishl explains the financial and political corruption in local government – but obviously has mixed motives.

Ken looks after his ex-student Dita Schwartz who has drastic dermatological surgery on her face. He meets Trekkie’s mother – who suddenly proposes marriage to him.

Dr Layamon takes Benn on hospital rounds, then persuades him to challenge Vilitzer for the money he owes. Benn and Matilda see Psycho which upsets him because he identifies with Norman Bates. He regards this as a warning, but marries her anyway.

Ken has dinner with Dita Schwartz and lectures her about his Parisian childhood. Ken and Benn attend the rape case parole board hearing They confront Vilitzer, but he refuses to give them the money he has made from the family property.

Ken flies to Seattle, bent on ‘revenge’ He smashes up Trekkie’s bathroom, then they discuss sharing custody of their daughter Nancy. Benn flies to Miami, where Vilitzer has just died. He then tricks Matilda into flying on to Rio, whilst he jets off instead to northern Finland on an arctic research expedition.

More Die of Heartbreak – principal characters

Kenneth Trachtenberg	the narrator, a Jewish professor of Russian literature who was born in France
Benn Crader	a midwestern botanist of Jewish origins with an international reputation
Rudi Trachtenberg	Ken”s father, a successful womaniser
Matilda Layamon	Benn’s rich and attractive second wife
Harold Vilitzer	a crooked politician who has cheated his own family
Fishl Vilitzer	his son, a seedy and incompetent ‘entrepreneur’
Treckie	Ken’s partner, who refused to marry him
Tanya Sterling	Trekkie’s mother – a cougar

More on Saul Bellow
More on the novella
More on short stories
Twentieth century literature

Mr Sammler’s Planet

October 1, 2017 by Roy Johnson

tutorial, study guide, commentary, further reading, web links

Mr Sammler’s Planet (1969) was first published in back-to-back issues of Atlantic Monthly. It was subsequently issued in one-volume novel form by Viking Press in 1970, and it won the National Book Award for Fiction the following year.

Mr Sammler’s Planet – commentary

The main theme

Bellow’s previous novels The Adventures of Augie March (1953), Henderson the Rain King (1959), and Herzog (1964) had all been commercially successful and widely critically acclaimed – but it was with Mr Sammlers Planet that he located his main theme – one which he was to continue exploring for the rest of his life as a creative writer. That theme was the role of the immigrant Jew in twentieth century America

In Bellow’s work (fiction and non-fiction essays) the immigrant Jew has a cultural identity- but an identity that has been formed ‘elsewhere’. This elsewhere is likely to be middle, northern, or Eastern Europe. The person has been driven by poverty, war, or anti-Semitism (or all three) to find refuge in a land which proclaims on its welcoming statue (of Liberty)

Give me your tired, your poor, Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free, The wretched refuse of your teeming shore. Send these, the homeless, tempest-tossed to me, I lift my lamp beside the golden door!

The problem, as Bellow sees it, is that once on American shores, the immigrant is pulled between preserving his (or her) own culture, and becoming assimilated as an American. This is normally characterised as a choice between two ways of life. The first is a traditional respect for liberal humanism, human decency, a love of arts, intellectualism, and a deep sense of cultural and political history. It is also likely to involve close bonds with family members.

The second is a no-holds-barred pursuit of individualism and personal liberty, embracing free-market capitalism, dog-eat-dog competition, get-rich-quick schemes, and devil-take-the-hindmost greed and corruption at all levels.

It is quite obvious which of these two options Bellow supports. Sammler is a Holocaust survivor. He cherishes his relatives and friends. He is a man of culture and sophistication, even though he is living on handouts from his nephew (and war reparations). He is a living representative of twentieth century history – a man who has dug his own grave and miraculously survived a Nazi execution squad. He will not let that experience fade as a measure of how he will interpret the behaviour of others.

The following extract captures this multiple, overlapping approach to a form of stream-of-consciousness in dealing with one of his favourite themes – the immigrant faced with the multiple possibilities of American life:

And the charm, the ebullient glamour, the almost unbearable agitation that came from being able to describe oneself as a twentieth-century American was available to all. To everyone who had eyes to read the papers or watch television, to everyone who shared the collective ecstasies of news, crisis, power. To each according to his excitability. But perhaps it was an even deeper thing. Humankind watched and described itself in the very turns of its own destiny. Itself the subject, living or drowning at night, itself the object, seen surviving or succumbing, and feeling in itself the fits of strength and the lapses of paralysis – mankind’s own passion simultaneously being mankind’s great spectacle, a think of deep and strange participation, on all levels, from melodrama and mere noisedown into the deepest layers of the soul and into the subtlest silences, where undiscovered knowledge is.

Bellow does not offer this as a simplistic example of victimhood. At one point Sammler reflects on the case of Chaim Rumkowski, a Jewish ‘leader’ in occupied Poland who assisted the Nazis, arranged the deportation of children to the death camps, and even abused young girls – before he was beaten to death by fellow inmates on arrival at Auschwitz in 1944. Bellow’s message is quite clear: the full horror must be confronted, and not forgotten.

But Sammler is surrounded by every excess that modern America can throw at him: the black pickpocket who intimidates him with an aggressive sexual gesture; his ex-student Feffer whose instinct is to exploit everything that comes his way; Wallace Gruner, the son of his nephew, described by his own father as a ‘high-IQ idiot’ who is full of mad entrepreneurial schemes to make money

The 1960s and sexual revolution

This novel is basically Bellow’s response to the social and sexual revolutions of the 1960s in America and Europe, coupled with his long-standing concern for the fate of immigrant Jews in post-Holocaust America

He takes a view that sides with what he sees as tradition and decency – Sammler is oppressed and appalled by the excesses of “a sexual madness [which] was overwhelming the Western world”. His young niece Angela is the living embodiment of the sexual revolution writ large. She dresses in provocatively in revealing clothes and flaunts her erotic life like a banner of defiance in a way Sammler clearly finds shocking.

The students on campus are in rebellion; beards proliferate; nobody gives a damn; and America is in full technological expansionist mood – preparing to put men on the moon. It captures the vibrancy and the excesses of the 1960s very accurately.

The planets

The novel was published in the same year as the first moon landings in 1969, and most readers will have little difficulty in appreciating the multiple symbols and references to planetary matters which run through the novel.

Artur Sammler inhabits the only planet he knows – the earth – and he tries to make sense of the gigantic contradictions that twentieth century history has thrown at him and his fellow survivors. He finds modern life – particularly in New York City – overwhelming.

But he reads Govinda Lal’s treatise on lunar colonisation with interest – largely as a symbolic suggestion that there might be alternatives to the horrors and unresolvable contradictions of life on earth.

His meeting with Dr Lal provides him with the one intellectually satisfying experience that occurs in the novel. Then throughout its events he catches glimpses of the moon which act as a reminder of this search for ‘alternatives’

Structure

Bellow is not normally strong on the structure of his novels. He seems to prefer a free-wheeling, improvisatory approach in which he introduces incidents and characters for their own sake, and does not (necessarily) tie them closely to his main theme. But it must be said that Mr Sammler’s Planet is a masterpiece of bravura plotting and organisation.

The content of the narrative is an amalgam of Sammler’s movements in New York, his reflections on political history, his slightly woolly and abstract ruminations on life, and the second-hand reports of activity from minor characters. But the amazing thing is that the entire events of the narrative take place over only two days.

This chronological compression is somewhat concealed, since so much of the narrative is taken up with flashbacks into Sammler’s earlier life. His ‘European’ experiences during and after the Holocaust are woven seamlessly into the account of events in 1960s New York. And since the narrative is delivered almost entirely from his point of view, the transitions between reminiscence and dramatic interaction between characters is almost imperceptible. It also has to be said that the resulting narrative is also padded out with generous passages of abstract reflection on Sammler’s part – a feature which one cannot help regarding as something of an indulgence on Bellow’s part, since it appears so frequently in all his other novels.

Things met with in this world are tied to the forms of our perception in space and time and to the forms of our thinking. We see what is before us, the present, the objective. Eternal being makes its temporal appearance in this way The only way out of captivity in the forms, out of confinement in the prison of projections, the only contact with the eternal, is through freedom.

Such passages become strangely heterogeneous, set as they are amongst events which sometimes border on the farcical – Sammler’s nephew flooding the house and crashing an aeroplane whilst taking photographs for instance. But fortunately, the novel as a whole is held together by the seriousness of Sammler’s search for meaning in a life composed of such disparate elements.

Mr Sammler’s Planet – study resources

Mr Sammler’s Planet – Penguin Classics – Amazon UK

Mr Sammler’s Planet – Penguin Classics – Amazon US

A Saul Bellow bibliography

Saul Bellow – Collected Stories – Penguin Classics – Amazon UK

Saul; Bellow – Collected Stories – Penguin Classics – Amazon US

Saul Bellow (Modern Critical Views) – essays and studies – Amz UK

Saul Bellow (Modern Critical Views) – essays and studies – Amz US

Cambridge Companion to Saul Bellow – Amazon UK

Mr Sammler’s Planet – summary

I. Artur Sammler is a seventy year old Polish Jew living in New York with his widowed niece Margotte. He has a semi-retarded and divorced daughter Shula who collects junk. They are all immigrant survivors of the Holocaust. He formerly lived in Bloomsbury London, and is something of an Anglophile. Shula has been urging him to write a memoir of H.G. Wells. She presents him with a scholarly paper on the colonisation of the moon written by a Dr Govinda Lal.

Sammler delivers a lecture on British politics in the inter-war years that is rudely challenged by students. Afterwards he is accosted by a black pickpocket he has seen on a bus journey each morning. The man follows Sammler home and exposes himself in a threatening manner in the lobby of the building.

II. Sammler struggles to make sense of urban life, which he finds overwhelming. He is visited by his sixty year old nephew Walter, who has a fetish for women’s plump arms. Sammler finds his confessions oppressive, as he does those of his niece Angela, who recounts the sexual details of her affair with an advertising executive.

Sammler visits his nephew Dr Elya Gruner who is in hospital after suffering an aneurysm. Gruner has been giving financial support to Sammler and his daughter Shula, and he is closely concerned with family ties. Sammler assumes that Elya’s wealth comes from Mafia-controlled real-estate investments.

Sammler has survived the end of the war hiding in a Polish mausoleum after surviving execution by a firing squad. He discusses Elya’s slim chances of survival with Elya’s son Wallace, who is an improvident wastrel eager to get hold of his father’s money.

III. He meets the fantasist Lionel Feffer who claims to be in a money-making scheme with Wallace. Feffer reports the theft of Dr Lal’s. manuscript by Shula and then exhorts from Sammler the story of the thief on the bus. He wants to sell the story to television, and at the same time he also brags about a bogus insurance claim he has made.

Sammler writes to Dr Lal, explaining that the manuscript is safe. He speculates about the interplanetary future of the earth and mankind, then recalls his survival from the Nazi execution squad and killing a German soldier during his escape. At the end of the war he was forced to escape from anti-Semitic attacks by the Poles. More recently, he has been to Israel to cover events in the Six-Day War

IV. At the hospital Sammler meets Angela who unburdens herself of the problems she has with her father. Sammler reflects on his experience during the Six-Day War, and then is joined by his son-in-law Eisen who wants to be an artist but has only produced worthless junk. Margotte phones to say Dr Lal ‘s manuscript is missing. Sammler promises he will retrieve the manuscript from Shula

V. En route to the Gruner house Wallace badgers Sammler about the black thief and other sex-related matters. Sammler finds Shula has Xeroxed the manuscript and put copies in safe deposit boxes at Grand Central Station. Margotte arrives with Dr Lal, who engages Sammler in a friendly discussion about H.G. Wells and space exploration. Their discussion then goes on to metaphysical considerations of human personality – which is interrupted by a flood of water caused by Wallace hunting for his father’s money, supposedly hidden somewhere in the house. When the fire brigade arrive Sammler goes outside and recalls his earlier visit to the Six-Day War and its heavy death toll.

VI. Next day Sammler reflects
on the other characters – Shula, Wallace, and Elya. He is frustrated by a series of delays preventing his return to New York. He wishes to rejoin the terminally sick Elya, who has some unfinished business to discuss with him. Lal’s manuscript is located, but there is no copy of it.

En route to the hospital the car is held up by a street confrontation in which Feffer photographs the black thief on the bus. The thief demands the camera, but is fought off by Feffer’s accomplice Eiser, who clubs him with a bag of cheap iron medallions. Sammler is upset by the incident.

At the hospital Angela reports that Wallace has crashed a plane whilst taking photographs of houses. Sammler and Angela argue about her refusal to apologise to her father. Shula telephones to say she has found Elya’s Mafia money hidden at the house – and meanwhile Elya has died.

Mr Sammler’s Planet – characters

Artur Sammler	a 70 year old Polish Jewish survivor of the Holocaust
Shula-Slawa	his slightly deranged divorced daughter who collects junk
Margotte Arkin	Sammler’s politically argumentative niece
Ussher Arkin	Margotte’s husband, killed in a plane crash
Dr Elya Gruner	Sammler’s nephew a retired gynaecologist and real estate owner
Angela Gruner	Gruner’s daughter, a sex pot
Wallace Gruner	Gruner’s son, ‘a high-IQ idiot’
Dr V. Govinda Lal	a professor of biophysics
Lionel Feffer	Sammler’s ex-student, a boastful spiv
Walter Bruch	Sammler’s nephew, a musicologist
Eisen	Shula’s estranged husband

More on Saul Bellow
More on the novella
More on short stories
Twentieth century literature

Mrs Dalloway

January 28, 2010 by Roy Johnson

tutorial, characters, video, criticism, study resources

Mrs Dalloway (1925) is probably the most accessible of Virginia Woolf’s great modernist novels. A day in the life of a London society hostess is used as the structure for her experiments in multiple points of view. The themes she explores are the nature of personal identity; memory and consciousness; the passage of time; and the tensions between the forces of Life and Death. The novel abandons conventional notions of plot in favour of a mosaic of events.

Virginia Woolf

She gives a very lyrical response to the fundamental question, ‘What is it like to be alive?’ And her answer is a sensuous expression of metropolitan existence. The novel also features her rich expression of ‘interior monologue’ as a narrative technique, and it offers a subtle critique of society recovering in the aftermath of the first world war. This novel is now seen as a central text of English literary modernism.

Mrs Dalloway – plot summary

The novel covers one day from morning to night in a woman’s life – Clarissa Dalloway, an upper-class society wife. As the novel opens she walks through the streets of London in the morning, getting ready to host a party that evening. The pleasant day reminds her of her youth at Bourton and makes her wonder about her choice of husband. She married the reliable Richard Dalloway instead of the enigmatic and demanding Peter Walsh, and she had not the option to be with Sally Seton towards whom she felt a strong attraction. Peter reintroduces these conflicts by paying a visit that morning, having returned from India that day. After his visit, he wanders off into Regent’s Park.

The point of view then shifts to Septimus Warren Smith, a veteran of World War I who is suffering from post traumatic stress (or ‘shell shock’ as it was first known). He is spending his day in the Park with his Italian-born wife, Lucrezia, waiting for an appointment with Sir William Bradshaw, a celebrated psychiatrist. Septimus is visited by frequent and indecipherable hallucinations, mostly concerning his dear friend Evans who died in the war. He cannot see anything of worth in the England he fought for, and he believes his lack of feeling is a crime. However, Sir William does not listen to him and diagnoses ‘a lack of proportion’. He proposes to send Septimus to a mental institution.

The scene switches again to conservative MP Richard Dalloway taking lunch with Hugh Whitbread and Lady Bruton, members of high society. After lunch, Richard returns home to Clarissa with a large bunch of roses. He intends to tell her that he loves her but finds that he cannot. Clarissa considers the void that exists between people, even between husband and wife.

Clarissa sees off her daughter Elizabeth and her history teacher, Miss Kilman, who are going shopping. The two older women dislike one another quite passionately, each believing the other to be an oppressive force over Elizabeth. Meanwhile, Septimus and Lucrezia are in their apartment, enjoying a moment of happiness together before the men come to take Septimus to the asylum. One of Septimus’s doctors, Dr. Holmes, arrives, and Septimus fears the doctor will destroy his soul. In order to avoid this fate, he jumps from a window to his death on the railings below.

In the evening, most of the novel’s characters (including people from her past) assemble for Clarissa’s party. It turns out to be a big success, but Clarissa cannot help feeling wistful about her friends and the fact that most of them have not achieved the dreams of their youth. She feels that even her daughter Elizabeth will be the same.

When Sir William Bradshaw arrives late his wife explains that one of his patients has committed suicide. Hearing this, Clarissa gradually identifies with Septimus, and feels that she understands his motives. She retires to reflect on the matter, seeing people such as Sir William Bradshaw antithetical to life, and admiring Septimus for his courage in resisting medical bullying.

The party nears its close, and the guests begin to leave, hereupon Clarissa re-enters the room and fills it with her ‘presence’. This fills Peter Walsh with awe, for despite his criticisms of Clarissa for leadingthe shallow life of a society hostess, he is forced to admit to himself that he admires her.

Video lecture

Part I of biographical documentary

Mrs Dalloway – study resources

Mrs Dalloway – Oxford World Classics – Amazon UK

Mrs Dalloway – Oxford World Classics – Amazon US

Mrs Dalloway – Penguin Classics – Amazon UK

Mrs Dalloway – Penguin Classics – Amazon US

Mrs Dalloway – Everyman Library Classics – Amazon UK

Mrs Dalloway – Everyman Library Classics – Amazon US

Mrs Dalloway – York Notes – Amazon UK

Mrs Dalloway – Cliffs Notes – Amazon UK

Approaches to Teaching Mrs Dalloway – Amazon UK

The Cornell Guide to Mrs Dalloway – Amazon UK

Mrs Dalloway – free eBook edition

Mrs Dalloway – 1998 dramatisation on DVD – Amazon UK

Mrs Dalloway – a facsimile page from Woolf’s manuscript

Mrs Dalloway – Virginia Woolf as a Modernist Writer – essay

Virginia Woolf – biographical notes

The Complete Works of Virginia Woolf – Kindle edition – Amazon UK

The Mrs Dalloway Reader – critical essays – Amazon UK

Approaches to Teaching Mrs Dalloway – Amazon UK

Selected Essays – by Virginia Woolf – Amazon UK

The Cambridge Companion to Virginia Woolf – Amazon UK

Virginia Woolf – Authors in Context – Amazon UK

The Cambridge Introduction to Virginia Woolf – Amazon UK

Virginia Woolf at Wikipedia – biographical notes, links

Virginia Woolf at Mantex – tutorials, web links, study materials

Photomontage

Mrs Dalloway’s walk – through modern day London

Principal characters

Richard Dalloway	a conservative Member of Parliament
Clarissa Dalloway	his wife – a society hostess
Elizabeth Dalloway	their 17 year old daughter
Septimus Warren Smith	a shell-shocked WWI veteran
Lucrezia Smith	his wife – an Italian millener
Peter Walsh	a romantic admirer of Clarissa’s
Sally Seaton	childhood close friend of Clarissa’s
Hugh Whitbread	a vacuous English gentleman
Doris Kilman	born-again Christian, Elizabeth’s teacher
Sir William Bradshaw	renowned London psychiatrist
Dr Holmes	Septimus’ unimaginative doctor
Lady Bruton	society lady and do-gooder
Evans	Septimus’s close friend in the war

Virginia Woolf podcast

A eulogy to words

Mrs Dalloway – first edition

Virginia Woolf, Mrs. Dalloway (1925) Dust jacket designed by Vanessa Bell.

This appeared only a few weeks after the publication of The Common Reader and although the reviews were mixed, the book had sold 2,000 copies by the end of the year.

This is the first of Virginia Woolf’s three great masterpieces (along with To the Lighthouse and The Waves. In it, she developed the experimental literary techniques which had been tried out in Jacob’s Room and brought them to an achievement of a high order.

“The reviews when they came were mixed, and so was Bloomsbury’s reaction. E.M. Forseter praised Mrs Dalloway and Virginia, gallantly kissing her hand and telling her the novel was better than Jacob’s Room and he was very pleased; but Vita Sackville-West was doubtful; and Lytton Strachey, admiring The Common Reader more, thought the novel was a flawed stone. Readers bought the book, however, and the sales were brisk. By June 18, one month after publication, Virginia noted that 1,250 copies had been sold … Leonard issued a second impression of 1,000 copies in November 1925.”

J.H. Willis Jr, Leonard and Virginia Woolf as Publishers: The Hogarth Press 1917-1941

Vanessa Bell’s design for the jacket of the novel features a bouquet of flowers. Diane Gillespie notes that the “design in which first the white, then the black dominates, the cover anticipates, if only in a general way, the alternating exhilaration and fear, sanity and insanity, as well as life and death which pervade the book”.

Elizabeth Willson Gordon, Woolf’s-head Publishing: The Highlights and New Lights of the Hogarth Press

Mont Blanc pen – the Virginia Woolf special edition

Other works by Virginia Woolf

To the Lighthouse (1927) is the second of the twin jewels in the crown of her late experimental phase. It is concerned with the passage of time, the nature of human consciousness, and the process of artistic creativity. Woolf substitutes symbolism and poetic prose for any notion of plot, and the novel is composed as a tryptich of three almost static scenes – during the second of which the principal character Mrs Ramsay dies – literally within a parenthesis. The writing is lyrical and philosophical at the same time. Many critics see this as her greatest achievement, and Woolf herself realised that with this book she was taking the novel form into hitherto unknown territory.
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Orlando (1928) is one of her lesser-known novels, although it’s critical reputation has risen in recent years. It’s a delightful fantasy which features a character who changes sex part-way through the book – and lives from the sixteenth to the twentieth century. Using this device (which turns out to be strangely credible) Woolf explores issues of gender and identity as her hero-heroine moves through a variety of lives and personal adventures. Orlando starts out as an emissary to the Court of St James, lives through friendships with Swift and Alexander Pope, and ends up motoring through the west end of London on a shopping expedition in the 1920s. The character is loosely based on Vita Sackville-West, who at one time was Woolf’s lover. The novel itself was described by Nigel Nicolson (Sackville-West’s son) as ‘the longest and most charming love-letter in literature’.
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The Bloomsbury Group is a short but charming book, published by the National Portrait Gallery. It explores the impact of Bloomsbury personalities on each other, plus how they shaped the development of British modernism in the early part of the twentieth century. But most of all it’s a delightful collection of portrait paintings and photographs, with biographical notes. It has an introductory essay which outlines the development of Bloomsbury, followed by a series of portraits and the biographical sketches of the major figures.

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Virginia Woolf – web links

Virginia Woolf at Mantex
Biographical notes, study guides to the major works, book reviews, studies of the short stories, bibliographies, web links, study resources.

Blogging Woolf
Book reviews, Bloomsbury related issues, links, study resources, news of conferences, exhibitions, and events, regularly updated.

Virginia Woolf at Wikipedia
Full biography, social background, interpretation of her work, fiction and non-fiction publications, photograph albumns, list of biographies, and external web links

Virginia Woolf at Gutenberg
Selected eTexts of the novels The Voyage Out, Night and Day, Jacob’s Room, and the collection of stories Monday or Tuesday in a variety of digital formats.

Woolf Online
An electronic edition and commentary on To the Lighthouse with notes on its composition, revisions, and printing – plus relevant extracts from the diaries, essays, and letters.

Hyper-Concordance to Virginia Woolf
Search texts of all the major novels and essays, word by word – locate quotations, references, and individual terms

Virginia Woolf – a timeline in phtographs
A collection of well and lesser-known photographs documenting Woolf’s life from early childhood, through youth, marriage, and fame – plus some first edition book jackets – to a soundtrack by Philip Glass. They capture her elegant appearance, the big hats, and her obsessive smoking. No captions or dates, but well worth watching.

Women’s History Walk in Bloomsbury
Tour of literary and political homes in Bloomsbury – including Gordon Square, Gower Street, Bedford Square, Tavistock Square, plus links to women’s history web sites.

Virginia Woolf Society of Great Britain
Bulletins of events, annual lectures, society publications, and extensive links to Woolf and Bloomsbury related web sites

BBC Audio Essay – A Eulogy to Words
Charming sound recording of radio talk given by Virginia Woolf in 1937 – a podcast accompanied by a slideshow of photographs.

A Family Photograph Albumn
Leslie Stephen compiled a photograph album and wrote an epistolary memoir, known as the “Mausoleum Book,” to mourn the death of his wife, Julia, in 1895 – an archive at Smith College – Massachusetts

Virginia Woolf first editions
Hogarth Press book jacket covers of the first editions of Woolf’s novels, essays, and stories – largely designed by her sister, Vanessa Bell.

Virginia Woolf – on video
Biographical studies and documentary videos with comments on Virginia Woolf and the Bloomsbury Group and the social background of their times.

Virginia Woolf Miscellany
An archive of academic journal essays 2003—2014, featuring news items, book reviews, and full length studies.

More on Virginia Woolf
Virginia Woolf – web links
Virginia Woolf – greatest works
Virginia Woolf – criticism
More on the Bloomsbury Group

Nabokov’s Complete Stories

September 24, 2009 by Roy Johnson

a critical examination of Nabokov’s collected stories

Nabokov’s Complete Stories is an analysis of the fifty collected tales included in Nabokov’s Dozen (1959), A Russian Beauty and Other Stories (1973), Tyrants Destroyed and Other Stories (1975), and Details of a Sunsetand Other Stories (1976).

In 1995 Nabokov’s son Dmitri edited and issued a single volume of Nabokov’s complete collected stories. This edition contained stories which had emerged since the author’s death and some very early works that Nabokov himself did not think were worth republishing. Studies and critiques of these earlier works are being added as a supplement here.

• Introduction

Part I – Apprentice Years: Stories 1924 – 1929

• A Matter of Chance
• Details of a Sunset
• The Thunderstorm
• Bachmann
• Christmas
• A Letter that Never Reached Russia
• The Return of Chorb
• A Guide to Berlin
• A Nursery Tale
• Terror
• The Passenger
• The Doorbell
• An Affair of Honour
• The Potato Elf

Part II – The European Master: Stories 1930 – 1939

• The Eye
• The Aurelian
• A Bad Day
• A Busy Man
• Terra Incognita
• Lips to Lips
• The Reunion
• Orache
• Music
• A Dashing Fellow
• Perfection
• The Admiralty Spire
• The Leonardo
• The Circle
• Breaking the News
• In Memory of L.I.Shigaev
• A Russian Beauty
• Torpid Smoke
• Recruiting
• A Slice of Life
• Spring in Fialta
• Cloud, Castle, Lake
• Tyrants Destroyed
• The Visit to the Museum
• Lik
• Vasiliy Shishkov

Part III – American Notes: Stories 1940 – 1951

• The Assistant Producer
• That in Aleppo Once…
• A Forgotten Poet
• Time and Ebb
• Conversation Piece
• Signs and Symbols
• The Vane Sisters
• Lance
• Conclusion

Additional Stories

• Additional stories

Vladimir Nabokov: The Collected Stories – Amazon UK
Vladimir Nabokov: The Collected Stories – Amazon US

Vladimir Nabokov web links
Vladimir Nabokov greatest works
Vladimir Nabokov criticism
Vladimir Nabokov life and works

Night and Day

June 1, 2015 by Roy Johnson

tutorial, commentary, study resources, plot. web links

Night and Day was Virginia Woolf’s second full-length novel. It was first published by Duckworth and Company in October 1919. (This was the publishing company owned by Woolf’s step-brother Gerald Duckworth.) An American edition appeared under the imprint of George H. Doran in 1920

first edition – Duckworth 1919

Night and Day – critical commentary

The main theme

Virginia Woolf had been writing about the plight of the young unmarried middle-class woman since her earliest works such as the short story Phyllis and Rosamund (1906). She continued to develop her observations and criticisms about women’s education and their role in society in her non-fiction polemic A Room of One’s Own (1929) and these ideas were further developed into her wholesale attack on the patriarchal nature of British society in Three Guineas (1938).

Katharine Hilbery has not been educated or trained to do anything useful except live at home with her parents. She feels oppressed by the family and its illustrious history, and her only possibility of change is the option of marriage, which is why she initially feels doomed to accept William Rodney’s offer when it comes along.

Katherine is very conscious of being cut off from the world of work – and she actively wishes she had a job. She sees this as an antidote to the somewhat pointless life she leads as an unmarried young woman living at home where she ‘helps’ her mother in the vanity project of writing her grandfather’s biography.

Work

The novel makes a strong critique of the emptiness of a young unmarried woman’s life, and contrasts this with the apparent satisfaction of being engaged in purposeful work.

The suffragist Mary Datchet is very conscious of her own independence, and proud of the fact that she has a ‘room of her own’ and works in an office for a cause in which she believes. However, she does not get paid for the work she does, and it is no surprise to eventually find that she is the daughter of a clergyman, and is thus being kept economically by her family. She is engaged in voluntary charity work, not paid employment; and she is not truly self-sufficient.

Woolf appears to have slightly romantic ideas about the nature and conditions of paid employment. Mary doesn’t start work until 10.00 am; she has expensive lunches; and she lives in central London in rooms which are spacious enough to host meetings – none of which she would be able to afford without the financial backing of her family.

Ralph Denham also doesn’t start work until 10.00 am, and seems to have endless amounts of free time for extended walks through London, for afternoon teas, and for visiting people in what would normally be working hours. He arranges to meet Katharine Hilbery for a serious discussion about his future in Kew Gardens – at three o’clock in the afternoon.

Ralph is bored by his own work as a solicitor’s clerk, and has romantic aspirations to be a journalist – having published a review in Mr Hilbery’s Critical Review. Woolf appears to be uncertain about his exact status: sometimes he claims to be a ‘solicitor’ but on other occasions he is described as a ‘solicitor’s clerk’. There is a big difference between the two.

William Rodney is supposed to be a government clerk – yet he has enough money to live in style; he owns a piano and collects expensive rare editions; and the Hilbery family think he is an acceptable match for Katharine. He too is free to attend a tea party in Cheyne Walk at half-past four in the afternoon

It’s as if Woolf didn’t want to populate her novel entirely with upper middle class people who lived off private incomes and investments, but could hardly conceptualise the lives of real working people. The result is that the three characters of Ralph Denham, William Rodney, and Mary Datchet are cyphers for working people, and are less convincing fictional characters as a result.

The text is modernist in that it reflects the technology of twentieth century life. People make telephone calls from their own homes (requesting a number from an operator) they take rides in cabs, the underground, and the omnibus (not yet abbreviated to ‘bus’) – yet it has to be said that the historical setting remains slightly vague. The only certainty is that the events pre-date 1914.

Weaknesses

The romantic oscillations and changes of mind between the four principal characters are dragged out to inordinate length. The indecisions and reversals of feelings might accurately reflect uncertainty in people’s feelings and their choices of romantic attachment, but something like twenty chapters of will-she, won’t-she (and will-he won’t-he) plus rather amateurishly orchestrated coincidental meetings put a great strain on the reader’s patience.

This element of the novel reaches almost farcical proportions in the passages dealing with William, Katherine, and Cassandra. For instance when William begs Katherine to return to their former engagement she tells him that Cassandra loves him more, at which he immediately reverses his choice and is united with Cassandra, who has been listening to the conversation in concealment – all within the space of a few short paragraphs. This is the material of a Brian Rix Whitehall farce. The novel becomes more like a radio or television soap opera than a carefully constructed novel.

If weakness can have a climax, the novel reaches one in its final chapters when the two male suitors are (quite reasonably) banned from the house by Mr Hilbery. But they are then forgiven and reinstated the following day, with no explanation given. Everyone is happy, as in a children’s story, and the serious social issues raised by the Ralph Denham—Katharine Hilbery match simply dissolve in a vaporous and false ‘resolution’.

It has been emphasised throughout the novel that Ralph Denham has no money, and is responsible for supporting the remainder of his family. It stretches credulity and the conventions of the realist novel that a family such as the Hilberys would permit their daughter to marry with so few prospects of being decently kept.

Moreover, Denham’s own prospects are also not resolved in any detail. He has been dissatisfied with his (ill-defined) work throughout the novel, occasionally nursing a fantasy of living in a cottage and writing a book, but this comes to nothing – so he is no further forward at the end of events than he was at their beginning.

Woolf also seems to forget that she endows him with the dubious habit of gambling with his scant savings on the Stock Exchange at the start of the novel – but this is never mentioned again after the first chapters. He neither loses money, nor pulls off a profitable investment. The issue is simply forgotten.

There are too many named but inconsequential characters cluttering the text. For instance, Mary Datchet’s brothers and sisters are introduced – Elizabeth, her older sister, her brother Edward who is an estate agent, and Christopher who is a law student. This might establish the social status of the children of a provincial rector, but they serve no purpose in the novel whatever, since they never reappear.

Denham’s college friend Harry Sandys is introduced in the middle of the novel, and is never mentioned again. The family relative Cyril Alardyce is living with a woman to whom he is not married, and much is made of the issue, but it is not related to the main events of the novel in any meaningful way, and once a visit of concern has been made, the topic disappears, never to be mentioned again.

Katharine’s interest in mathematics is established as her individualist reaction to the weight of social convention that she finds so oppressive. She is expected to pour tea and make polite conversation with visitors but (we are expected to believe) she has a private passion which provides a separate life outside this public realm, located in the abstract realm of numerical calculations. The problem is that this private passion is never dramatised or expressed in any way. Indeed, it is simply not mentioned again after its first appearance in the text.

These weaknesses are what would normally be described as ‘loose ends’ – that is, issues which are not successfully integrated or resolved in the overall scheme of the novel. But there are simply too many of them, and these weaknesses, coupled with the poorly executed finale to the main drama, suggest a novel which has simply not been carefully conceived or written.

Night and Day – study resources

Night and Day – Oxford World Classics – Amazon UK

Night and Day – Oxford World Classics – Amazon US

Night and Day – Wordsworth Classics – Amazon UK

Night and Day – Wordsworth Classics – Amazon US

Night and Day – eBook formats at Project Gutenberg

The Complete Works of Virginia Woolf – Kindle edition – Amazon UK

Night and Day – Vintage Classics – Amazon UK

Night and Day – Vintage Classics – Amazon US

Virginia Woolf – biographical notes

The Cambridge Introduction to Virginia Woolf – Amazon UK

Selected Essays – by Virginia Woolf – Amazon UK

The Cambridge Companion to Virginia Woolf – Amazon UK

Virginia Woolf – Authors in Context – Amazon UK

Virginia Woolf at Wikipedia – biographical notes, links

Virginia Woolf at Mantex – tutorials, web links, study resources

Night and Day – plot summary

Chapter I. During a Sunday afternoon tea party in Cheyne Walk, Katharine Hilbery shows Ralph Denham some of the relics and souvenirs of her illustrious family. They spar with each other about issues of class and family traditions.

Chapter II. Ralph returns to his lower middle-class family home in Highgate, his mind full of Katharine and the comforts of her fashionable home. He wishes to study alone, but his elder sister Joan brings him news of a family problem which they haven’t the money to solve.

Chapter III. This chapter recounts the history of Katharine’s famous family – of which she is the only child. She and her mother are making no progress with a biography of her grandfather, the famous poet Richard Alardyce. Katharine tries to create a disciplined approach to the task, but her mother lacks all sense of proportion, selection, structure, or purpose. Katharine looks after her mother, and has a secret interest in mathematics.

Chapter IV. Ralph meets Katharine again when he attends a meeting hosted by his suffragist friend Mary Datchet. The speaker William Rodney performs badly. Katharine and Mary discuss work, and Ralph again spars with Katharine regarding class. Katharine leaves the meeting with William Rodney.

Chapter V. Ralph and his friend Harry Sandys follow Katharine and Rodney through the streets to the Embankment. Rodney wants to marry Katharine, but he has essentially chauvinistic views about women. He insists on sending her home in a cab. On then meeting Ralph, Rodney invites him back home for a drink. Ralph is impressed by the cultivated ambiance, and warms to him. He borrows a play Rodney is writing, and a few days later receives an expensive rare edition Rodney has sent him from his collection.

Chapter VI. Mary is happy to begin each day in her own room, and she is very conscious of being a ‘worker’ – although she does not get paid. She works in the morning, then over a substantial lunch she fantasises about Ralph, with whom she is in love. In the afternoon Katharine visits the office, where she becomes the recipient of proselytising on behalf of the suffragist movement. When Ralph arrives there is tension between Katherine and Mary. Ralph leaves with Katharine and then on a bus ride home they return to the subject of culture and his poverty.

Chapter VII. Katherine spends the evening at home having dinner with her parents. Her mother nostalgically recalls the family’s complex history. Katharine remains conscious of the suffragist office.

Chapter VIII. Katharine receives a proposal of marriage from William Rodney and a letter from her aunt regarding her cousin Cyril Alardyce, who is living with a woman to whom he is not married. She discusses the family problems with her father, but he disclaims any responsibility and leaves her to report the news to her mother.

Chapter IX. Katharine feels oppresses by her home, her family, and its history. Mrs Hilbery loses herself in reminiscence instead of working on the biography. Mrs Milvain suddenly appears to discuss the case of Cyril Alardyce. They are then joined by another spinster relative.

Chapter X. Joan thinks anxiously but romantically about her brother Ralph’s future. He is divided between dreams and unrealised ambitions. He has odd hobbies, and he gambles on the Stock Exchange. He goes to see his friend Mary Datchet, even though his thoughts are full of Katharine. He patronises Mary, and is unaware of her strong feelings for him.

Chapter XI. Katharine has written to William Rodney refusing his offer of marriage.She visits his rooms for tea and they talk unsuccessfully about poetry. Yet she feels doomed to marry him, and reverses her decision.

Chapter XII. Ralph visits the Hilbery house and unexpectedly finds Katharine at home. They engage in the usual sparring, but they are interrupted by the arrival of Katharine’s aunts who turn the conversation to literature and family reminiscences. Ralph is angry when they reveal that Katharine is engaged to marry William Rodney. He leaves abruptly in a state of acute disillusionment, and feels he has been betrayed.

Chapter XIII. Ralph meets Mary Datchet in Lincoln’s Inn Fields. He is in very low spirits, but will not say what is bothering him. She tries to encourage him, and invites him to her family home for Christmas.

Chapter XIV. Mary goes on to a committee meeting where she finds it difficult to concentrate because of her thoughts about Ralph. She goes home and is visited by Katharine and William Rodney who announce their engagement. She finds something attractive about Katharine, whom she compares to Ralph.

Chapter XV. Ralph visits Mary at her family home in Lincolnshire over Christmas. The scene is one of deep rural life in an old house. He settles comfortably in the welcoming hospitality of the family and feels rejuvenated by the country ambiance.

Chapter XVI. Katharine is also in Lincolnshire at nearby Stogdon House for the Christmas holidays. She sits in the garden at night, worrying about her relationship to William Rodney. She shares her feelings with her favourite cousin Henry Otway. They are interrupted by William Rodney, who is jealous and possessive regarding Katharine.

Chapter XVII. Katharine tries to discuss marriage with her mother and her aunt Charlotte. She cannot understand why her feelings have changed since leaving London, but she realises that she does not love the man she is due to marry. A party from the house sets off for a ritual outing to Lincoln.

Chapter XVIII. Ralph and Mary are walking through the fields towards Lincoln. She is in love with him: he is in love with Katharine, but does not mention it. He suddenly invents a romantic plan to give up work, live in the countryside, and write a book – but the plan noticeably excludes Mary. Ralph is momentarily tempted to ask Mary to marry him, but when he finally realises that she loves him, he changes his mind. When he sees Katharine in the street, Mary finally realises that he is in love with her. The two groups meet by accident and Ralph tells Katharine about his ‘plans’. William Rodney and Katharine then argue, and she tells him that she doesn’t love him, whereupon he is distraught, and cries, after which she changes her mind and agrees to marry him.

Chapter XIX. As Ralph and Mary walk back from Lincoln he suddenly asks her to marry him – but she realises his heart isn’t in it, and she refuses. They eventually, and reluctantly agree to remain friends, but neither of them feels very happy about the arrangement.

Chapter XX. Mary returns to her work in the wake of her disappointment. She feels disillusioned and unable to fully believe in the cause for which she is working. But she eventually adopts a stoical attitude and accepts that she might not be happy, but that she wishes to face up to the Truth.

Chapter XXI. Mary goes home and tries to write, still thinking about Ralph. She is visited by Katharine, towards whom she feels hostile. Both women want to unburden themselves about their feelings. Finally Mary reveals the full truth – that she is in love with Ralph, who is in love with Katharine. Mary feels a complex mixture of humiliation and happiness at having made the revelation.

Chapter XXII. Katharine is inspired by what she has learned, and is late for an appointment with William Rodney. But when she arrives full of intention, he waves his newfound interest in Cassandra Otway in her face as a provocation. They discuss their lack of romantic interest in each other in an emotionally sadistic manner. Katharine almost persuades him that he is in love with Cassandra – but their discussion is interrupted by the sudden arrival of Ralph.

Chapter XXIII. They all feel very awkward with each other, and are unable to speak their minds. Ralph leaves with Katharine, and makes a full revelation of his feelings about her. He also confesses his mistreatment of Mary. Katharine is privately elated by what she hears, but does not respond. Ralph goes home feeling angry about William Rodney.

Chapter XXIV. Mrs Hilbery develops an enthusiasm for Shakespeare, and Katharine is restless. Katharine invites her cousin Cassandra to visit them. She is puzzled by the connections between Ralph, William, Mary, herself, and now Cassandra. She feels that the ‘love’ in these connections should somehow be cherished. She arrives home to find William Rodney at tea. They spar with each other regarding Cassandra, and put their engagement on hold whilst he tests out the possibilities of a relationship with Cassandra- but without making it known publicly.

Chapter XXV. Katharine meets Ralph in Kew Gardens and is impressed by his botanical knowledge. He offers her a compact of honesty and friendship – and she accepts it.

Chapter XXVI. Cassandra Otway arrives in London, young and enthusiastic. There is a dinner party at the Hilyers where Katharine senses that William is getting closer to Cassandra. She leaves them together and visits Mary. There she meets Mr Basnett, a social reformer. When she arrives back home, William and Cassandra are both very happy.

Chapter XXVII. William, Katharine, Ralph, and Cassandra visit the zoo. William is angry and argues with Katharine. Ralph decides to humiliate Katharine by taking her to his home for tea. She is shocked aesthetically but warms to the conviviality of close family life. Ralph feels that his plan has failed, and they draw closer in their friendship pact again. He gives up his plan to live in a cottage.

Chapter XXVIII. Ralph tries to exorcise his obsession with Katharine, but fails completely. He wants to communicate his feelings to someone, and goes to see Mary, where he inflicts them on her. Then he goes to the Hilbery house, where he meets William leaving. They admit to each other that they are in love with and suffering because of Katharine.

Chapter XXIX. That night Cassandra reveals to Katharine that she has been affronted by a declaration from William – which causes Katharine to reveal that they are no longer engaged. Next day Mrs Milvain arrives to say that people are talking about the irregular ‘engagement’. William arrives to tell Katharine that they should drop the connection with Cassandra and revert to their former fully-engaged status. Katharine reveals that Cassandra is in love with him, whereupon he changes his mind. Cassandra has overheard their conversation, and is united with William.

Chapter XXX. Ralph has been loitering outside the house, hoping to see Katharine. When he is admitted, Rodney’s new engagement is revealed, and Ralph is left to talk with Katharine alone. They both feel ambiguous about their love for each other. Mrs Hilbery interrupts them to discuss poetry.

Chapter XXXI. Cassandra wants to be married on the same day as Katharine, who is still uncertain about the true nature of her relationship to Ralph. She feels under pressure from Cassandra and Rodney. She visits Mary (who is no longer in love with Ralph, though she regrets the fact) and they search for him fruitlessly throughout London. But when Katharine goes back home he is waiting for her and she collapses with love for him.

Chapter XXXII. The two couples celebrate by going out to a music hall, then for the next two days go to Greenwich and Hampton Court. Mrs Milvain then reports her suspicions to Mr Hilbery. When he questions Katharine she tells him that her engagement to Rodney has been mutually called off. Mr Hilbery demands explanations from Katharine, who will only say that she is no longer engaged. She and Ralph are suffering some sort of metaphysical problem about their relationship.

Chapter XXXIII. Mr Hilbery bans Ralph and William from the house, and sends Cassandra back home to Lincolnshire. Mrs Hilbery returns from Stratford and is entirely sympathetic to Katharine’s problem. She goes out to collect Ralph and William and brings them back to Cheyne Walk. They are joined by Cassandra who has missed her train. All is forgiven, and the two couples become engaged.

Chapter XXXIV. After dinner Ralph and Katharine take a bus ride and walk to Mary Datchet’s rooms – but Ralph cannot bring himself to go in and tell her their news.

Oxford World Classics edition

Night and Day – characters

Richard Alardyce	a great 19 century poet – Katharine’s grandfather
Mr Trevor Hilbery	editor of the Critical Review – Katharine’s father
Mrs Hilbery	Alardyce’s only child – Katharine’s mother
Katharine Hilbery	their only child (27)
Ralph Denham	a solicitor’s clerk (29)
Joan Denham	his elder sister (33)
Mary Datchet	a suffragist volunteer (25)
William Rodney	a government clerk and aesthete
Harry Sandys	a college friend of Denham
Mrs Celia Milvain	Katharine’s interfering aunt – Hilbery’s sister
Cyril Alardyce	lecturer at workmen’s college – Katharine’s cousin
Reverend Wyndham Datchet	Mary’s father – a rector
Elizabeth Datchet	Mary’s elder sister
Edward Datchet	an estate agent – Mary’s brother
Christopher Datchet	a law student
Henry Otway	Katharine’s favourite cousin in Lincolnshire
Lady Charlotte Otway	Katharine’s aunt
Cassandra Otway	Katharine’s attractive cousin (22)
Horace Basnett	a young radical social reformer

Other works by Virginia Woolf

Kew Gardens is a collection of experimental short stories in which Woolf tested out ideas and techniques which she then later incorporated into her novels. After Chekhov, they represent the most important development in the modern short story as a literary form. Incident and narrative are replaced by evocations of mood, poetic imagery, philosophic reflection, and subtleties of composition and structure. The shortest piece, ‘Monday or Tuesday’, is a one-page wonder of compression. This collection is a cornerstone of literary modernism. No other writer – with the possible exception of Nadine Gordimer, has taken the short story as a literary genre as far as this.
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Virginia Woolf is a readable and well illustrated biography by John Lehmann, who at one point worked as her assistant and business partner at the Hogarth Press. It is described by the blurb as ‘A critical biography of Virginia Woolf containing illustrations that are a record of the Bloomsbury Group and the literary and artistic world that surrounded a writer who is immensely popular today’. This is an attractive and very accessible introduction to the subject which has been very popular with readers ever since it was first published..
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Buy the book at Amazon US