Memory and Modernity: Exploring Urban Disillusionment and the Search for Meaning in Virginia Woolf’s Mrs. Dalloway and Beyond

Abstract

Modernist literature has left an indelible mark by delving into the profound impact of existential anxiety and disorientation that emerges when individuals find themselves ensnared in a web of disillusionment with no clear escape route. This exploration starkly delineates that alienation has been a consistent facet of human experience since the inception of modern capitalist ideas, particularly influencing minds and hearts in urban landscapes. Consequently, the examination of disillusionment remains pertinent in our contemporary society, where urban marginality, memory, and institutional influences continue to intricately shape our lives in complex and opaque ways. Against this backdrop, the present study, with the help of select text, Mrs. Dalloway (1925) written by Virginia Woolf, is an attempt to bring the alienation theme that offers the author’s views not just on a kind of “transformation” amplifying humans’ separation from the world but also on the troubles of the Modern Age. On the one hand, mirroring the fractured state of society and memories, where individuals are isolated and unable to communicate effectively symbolizes emotional emptiness, where characters or societies experience a lack of connection, meaning, or fulfilment. In other words, the present study can serve as a metaphor for the erosion of moral values, cultural decay, and the breakdown of social structures. On the other hand, it strives to provide women with the proper clues through their constant struggles and tireless resistance to have meaning in their lives.