Robert Strupp’s Reviews > Mrs. Dalloway > Status Update

Still trudging along struggling with the half-page sentences of the world's greatest ever, ever, writer Virginia Woolf ~ "...the grey tide of service which washed around Lady Bruton day in, day out, collecting, intercepting, enveloping her in a fine tissue which broke concussions, mitigated interruptions, and spread round the house in Brook Street in a fine net where things lodged and were picked out accurately..."

Becoming a tiny bit more comprehensible as I slow my reading down to 'Dick and Jane' levels not used in the past seven decades. Right now, it is not fun to read this book. Hopefully, by the time I reach page 194, I'll have gained some benefit from reading this book.

I noticed this 1981 Harvest Book edition displayed an odd font, which bothers me almost as much as Woolf's jerky writing. I finally read the back cover and hence have learned that this novel covers one day in the life of Mrs. Dalloway. Great.

(Another "must read Classic") On page 12, after a 14 page 'Forward' mandating to the reader the facts of how awesome the writing of Virginia Woolf was a century ago. Attempting to be worthy to grasp in my unworthy paws, this goddess's book, I've slowed to 1/2 of my usual reading speed of 238wpm. I find the writing jerky and the constant parenthesized statements seeming like I'm reading a rushed diary's entry.