The Connell Guide to Virginia Woolf's Mrs Dalloway (Advanced study text guide) by John Sutherland

by John Sutherland

It is hard to find anyone nowadays who will dare venture a bad word on Mrs its status as a pioneer feminist text and a brilliantly experimental work is wholly secure. At the time of its publication, however, opinions were more mixed. It was hard in the mid-1920s to come to terms with what, for many, seemed a vexatiously new-fangled work. Mrs Dalloway is a novel which provokes thought about the fraught nature of genius, literary modernism, the ambiguous place of women in English society and literature, the infinite complexities of sexual relationships, and even the worthwhileness of life itself.

Paperback

Published January 1, 1769

About the author

John Andrew Sutherland is a British academic, newspaper columnist and author. He is Emeritus Lord Northcliffe Professor of Modern English Literature at University College London.

Reviews

[emilia · Rating 4 out of 5]

3.75/5
Decent basic all-round analysis of 'Mrs Dalloway', sometimes a little surface-level or vague, but mostly very interesting and actually very readable. Not dry academic jargon. This was only really useful to me for its references to other critics (very abundant so I appreciate that), but for its purpose as a concise "guide" this is very good.
Slightly weird formatting with the sections in smaller blue font which you have to flick back and forth to read alongside the main text. Also I wish there was a better bibliography indicating the precise references for all the critics' quotes. Maybe you can find it online but it could have just been included in the back with the "further reading".