Fascinated By Bond Street

LOGO

The Wall Street Journal: Here
https://www.wsj.com/articles/londons-regents-park-is-having-a-moment-1413992794

“There was Regent’s Park. Yes. As a child, he had walked in Regent’s Park–odd, he thought, how the thought of childhood keeps coming back to me–the result of seeing Clarissa, perhaps; for women live much more in the past than we do, he thought. They attach themselves to places; and their fathers–a woman’s always proud of her father.” ― p. 55.

Peter Walsh is an old friend of Clarissa’s, who has his own painful past. Clarissa, for her part-- had never really liked him, or at least not enough to had gotten married to him. But when Peter is back from India, and happened to be one of her guests on the party, Clarissa, for the first time felt anew by his presence. What’s even more interesting is that, she finds out that he intends to divorce his current wife,—he too was still in love with Clarissa.

Non Descript: Source--Web

So, there was no excuse; nothing whatever the matter, except the sin for which human nature had condemned him to death; that he did not feel. He had not cared when Evans was killed; that was worst; but all the other crimes raised their heads and shook their fingers and jeered and sneered over the rail of the bed in the early hours of the morning at the prostrate body which lay realizing its degradation; how he had married his wife without loving her; had lied to her; seduced her; outraged Miss Isabel Pole, and was so pocked and marked with vice that women shuddered when they saw him in the street. The verdict of human nature on such a wretch was death.” ―p.91.

Peter feels very disconnected to the present by his past—a past that was still haunting him. He blamed himself for marrying a woman he had never liked. And what this means is that, he had been unfair to his current wife. I wonder what a terrible life that can be.

http://s70.photobucket.com/user/marydithlovesu/media/6-4.jpg.html

Source: Photobucket

Clarissa

“…it is a thousand pities never to say what one feels….” ―, p.116.

This short quotation means a lot more than it seems. I wonder she meant to say, it’s a pity to not be able to find someone with whom to be entirely yourself? Chances are, when we find such a person, it's more likely that we often find ourselves taking advantage of them.

                                                                    Image Source:
https://s3.amazonaws.com/user-media.venngage.com/313937-c8ecf4913c736ebe4c7552bd2304f739.gif
                                                                   

Infograph

“Death was defiance. Death was an attempt to communicate; people feeling the impossibility of reaching the center which, mystically, evaded them; closeness drew apart; rapture faded, one was alone. There was an embrace in death.” ― p.184.

I think Clarissa mean to say here, that death is something that in the end, we all must come to term with, and that instead of fighting back at all cost to save our own skin, we can be indifferent to it. These quotations are very personal to me, more so because they simply reflect the truth of our collective struggle in this universe. This novel is filled with profound ideas and insight about the human psyche. Yet, I think these were her own thoughts about what she felt about the mystery of death.

                                                                         

                                                                Ordinary Finds: Source--
                   https://www.google.com/search?q=images+from+Mrs.+Dalloway+novel&noj=

Mrs. Dalloway

“Every time she gave a party she had this feeling of being something not herself, and that everyone was unreal in one way; much more real in another. It was, she thought, partly their clothes, partly being taken out of their ordinary ways, partly the background, it was possible to say things you couldn’t say anyhow else, things that needed an effort; possible to go much deeper. But not for her; not yet anyhow.” ―  pgs. 170-71.

                                                             

It's too fascinating how it's backstage that we begin to understand the party scene, which this entire book seemed to be built around. Besides the tour that she takes us on from the kitchen to introducing guests, there seemed to be a lot of ironies. The most prominant of them is in the case of Septimus who did not want to die, but thought that the only way to save himself was to die sooner. Meanwhile, with all that's going on, she managed the party efficiently.

Something else I find common in human being, which supports the saying; that "Human nature is unfathonable," --which is  true-- is our ability to hide our true self. And this is something we all do. Yet we find it confusing when we notice that someone who we want to know entirely, and then comes tofind out that somehow, that person is still holding something back from us. And this masking of ourselves brings harm not only to those we love but to us. Clarissa is sensitive enough to be contemplating this.

Video of Mrs. Dalloway. Very Clear