Virginia
Woolf wanted to experiment in art like all modernists , she rejected the
standards of the novelist she considered materialists Arnold Bennet and Johr
Glasworthy because she wanted to focus the attention ON SUBJECTIVITY OF THE
CHARACTER, THEIR CONSCIOUSNESS. She thought that only subjectivity and
consciousness could convey the truth of human experience: the truth of life. In
order to reach her aim she tried hard to create novels that rendered the flow
of consciousness, its stream that explains for the rhythm of her prose and the
use of language reminding the language of poetry. Flashbacks and flash-forwards
are the means through which she conveys the inner life of her characters
because this is the way the mind works. She adopted and was a skilled exponent
of THE STREAM CONSCIOUSNESS EXTREME 
given through FREE INDIRECT STYLE, THE ECLIPSE OF THE NARRATOR
AND SHIFT OF THE POINT OF VIEW, THE INTERIOR MONOLOGUE.

Her idea of
life is well expressed in The Common Reader (1925) where she invites the
reader to look within and life. Here she wants the reader to EXAMIN  what happens in a mind, an ordinary mind, on
an ordinary day (the life of Monday or Tuesday). She explains that the mind
receives impressions of a different nature (trivial or banal but also very
important). Such impressions are incessant and they create the shape of a day. Since
it is such impressions that make up people's ordinary life it is such
impressions that the writer has to convey to the reader. It follows that "
there would be no plot, no comedy, no tragedy, no love interest or catastrophe
in the accepted style....". according to Virginia Woolf thought LIFE CAN NOT BE
RETURNED TO THE READER IN A SERIES OF "GIG-LAMPS SYMMETRICALLY ARRANGED".
Virginia Woolf concludes the essays highlighting the concept that the novelist's
task is TO CONVEY THE UNKNOW SPIRIT OF ONE'S CONSCIOUSNESS.

MOMENTS OF BEING(Virginia Woolf)

Virginia
Woolf is recognize  as one of the great
innovators of modern fiction. Her experiments with point of view had influenced
many writers that followed her. But particularly interesting technique that
does not seem to reach much attention is her use of "moments of being"  àto wonder why some moments are so powerful
and memorable- even if the events themselves are unimportant- that they can be
vividly recalled why others (events) are easily forgotten. She concludes that
there are 2 kinds of experiences:  

·        
Moments
of being

·        
Moments
of nonbeing

Moments of
nonbeing appear to be MOMENTS THAT THE INDIVIDUAL IS NOT CONSCIOUSLY AWARE
OF  even as she or he experiences them.
Virginia Woolf notes that people perform routine tasks such as walking and
shopping without thinking about that. This is part of the life "not lived
consciously", but instead is embedded in " a kind of nondescript cotton wool".

It is not
the nature of the actions that separates moments of being from moments of
nonbeing. One activity is not intrinsically more mundane or more extraordinary
than the other. Instead, IT IS THE INTENSITY OF FEELING, ONE'S CONSCIOUSLY OF
THE EXPERIENCE, that separates the two moments.

A walk in
the country can easily be hidden behind the cotton wool for one person, but
Virginia Woolf the experience is very vivid. Virginia Woolf asserts that this
moment of being THIS FLASHES OF AWARENESS, REVEAL A PATTERN HIDDEN BEHIND THE
COTTON WOOL OF DAILY LIFE that we " I mean all human beings-are connected with
this. That the whole world is a work of art; that we are parts of the work of
art."

But the
individual artist is not important in this work of art. Instead Virginia Woolf
says of all people "we are the words; we are the work of art; we are the music;
we the thing itself." Thus for Virginia Woolf a moment of being is a MOMENT
WHEN AN INDIVIDUAL IS FULLY CONSCIOUS OF HIS EXPERIENCE, A MOMENT WHEN HE IS
NOT ONLY AWARE OF HIMSELF BUT CATCHES A GLIMPSE OF HIS CONNECTION TO A LARGER
PATTERN HIDDEN BEHIND THE OPAQUE SURFACE OF THEIR LIFE.

Unlike moments
of nonbeing, when the individual lives and act without awareness, performing
acts as if asleep, the moment of being opens up a hidden reality.

Moments of
being can be found throughout Woolf's fiction... Examine example from her novels Mrs
Dalloway to The light house and Between the acts. These are
often moment of INTENSE POWER AND BEAUTY.

Unlike Joyce's
epiphanies this moments do not reveal something important for the character but
they provide moments of energy and awareness that allowed the character who experiences
them to see life more clearly and more fully if only briefly. And some of the character
to share the vision that they glimpse making the work of art that is life Mrs
Dalloway presents the two character who are more receptive in all of Virginia
Woolf fiction: Clarissa Dalloway and Septimus Warrensmith. Clarissa experiences
her moment of being while in the middle of what appears to be trivial acts,
indicating that IT IS NOT THE ONLY ACTION, BUT HER AWARENESS THAT SETS A MOMENT
OF BEING APART FROM HER OTHER EXPERIENCES. For example, as Clarissa watches taxicabs
pass by she finds them "absolutely absorbing". Her thought reveal "what
she loved was this, here, now, in front of her, the fat lady in the cab... Did it
matter that she must inevitably cease completely...or did it not become consoling
to believed that somehow in the streets of London on the ebb and flow of
things, here, there she survived.

Throughout
the day Clarissa is particularly aware of their threads of connection between
herself and her surroundings. The moment of beings ARE MARKED BY PARTICULARLY
VIVID AND POWERFUL LANGUAGE. Because they are moment of exact feelings, the
language used to convey them, must naturally be evocative and precise.

THE FORM
AND CONTENT MUST BE IN PERFECT SIMMETRY. In her moments of being Virginia Woolf
USES A LANGUAGE THAT APROCES POERTY CLARITY IS PERCISELY WHAT VIRGINIA WOOLF
ACIVES IN A MOMENT OF BEING.