What an extraordinary night!

I’m going to analyse the extract “ what an extraordinary night” written by Virginia Woolf.

The extract is organised into 7 pharagraphs.

The first one highlights Clarissa’s reaction to Septimus’s death:he committed suicide.
Clarissa is annoyed, the notice of death ruins party’s atmosphere. In these lines the intelligent reader can appreciate one of the tipical tecniques of Modernist literature; the novellist makes the reader see, feel the scene and this adds reality to the story.

In order to explain my words I would resort to the moment in which the narratordescribes the reacton of Clarissa’s body.

“her dress flamed, her body burnt. He had thrown himself from a window. Up had flashed the ground through him, blundering, bruising, went the rusty spikes” Septimus’s death makes Clarissa reflect on life and death: the writer shows her feelings throught an interior monologue in which the reader can appreciate the connection between mind and external world. With the use of this tecnique the reader can reflect on clarissa’s thoughts and at the same time can see what happens at the party. Clarissa is wondering herself why Septimus committed suicide:he didn’t find a sense, and without a sense life is insignificant. This way of thinking embodies a Modernist point of view.

Going on analysing the narrator introduces a new character : Sir Bradshaws, spetimus’s psychiatrist. Clarissa immidiately expresses her negative point of view: he is an evil because he is capable of atrocities, he forces your soul. 

In the fourth sequence Clarissa is thinking about death which comes in a moment of intense happiness. Going on analysing the extract, the reader can see two different attitudes: Clarissa feces life while Septimus can’t bear it. He didn’t find a sense, a balance and he committed suicide in order to communicate his feelings.

Clarissa is different from Septimus: she knows that life is difficult but she tries to go on living remembering her happy moments. Maybe, Clarissa doesn’t committ suicide because she is afraid about death which is an undiscovered country from which no one return.

Septimus’s death touches Clarissa’s feeling and she takes distances from her party going next to the window. It is a very important element because reminds to the idea of death, it brings  to Clarissa’s mind the way he committed suicide. Secondly, the window is foundamental because it  represent the communication between inner and outer life. She sees an old lady who is going to bed , alone. This scene also reminds to the idea of death. You die alone, but humans are social animals, and when they are alone, when they feel alienated, when thet feel lost, they can’t bear life. Very significant is the name Septimus. Seven is the numeber of death.