InterChange Conference on Woolf's The Waves (pp.182-297)

June 27, 2000

Karin Westman:

As Laura told us yesterday, Woolf wrote to Ethel Smyth that *The Waves* would be a novel that was "completely opposed to the tradition of fiction," and that she was "casting about all the time for some rope to throw to the reader" (Letter #2224, 28 Aug 1930). Bounced as we are along the waves of her narrative, we do seem to get a few "ropes": Percival; names for the voices/character(s); movement through time (a day in the italicized "preludes" or "interludes" and a lifetime for the voices); recurring images/actions.

Woolf's comment suggests that readers may need "ropes" to read: Does her novel suggest we need "ropes" to live, as well? How important are "ropes" to the characters of the narrative? What helps them survive, succeed, live their lives? Are their "ropes" material objects, other people...or perhaps not necessary at all?

Elizabeth Andrews:

I think that the individual episodes in which each character is faced with the question of finding meaning in their life acts as a rope. But also, the moments of friendship (or rather, companionship) seem important to balance their lives. Obviously there is a value that they find in each other and that value acts as a rope to tie their memories together in a meaningful way.

John Brooks:

I don't think you always need "ropes" to read, but in a book like this, where the prose seems to be detatched from what is actually happening, you've got to have them. That makes no sense, but what I mean is that it is as if this book was not written to be "read," as one would read Jane Austen or something, where everything fits together, but it was more likely written to be experienced. Whew. Does that make any sense?

Karin Westman:

What do the moments of friendship allow? Can you be more specific, Elizabeth?

Amy Ketner:

Everyone in life needs something familiar that they are able to return to in times of need and doubt. Ropes are just that--they tie people and events and memories together and it is from these ropes that the web of human life is woven. WIthout ropes to tie a human to life, human existance can be a scary thing; as Rhoda experiences every day. Rhoda emds up killing herself becuase she dosent trust any of the ropes that are before her eyes to grasp.

Nora Parrish:

Ropes seem to be connections of a sort. Woolf wants her readers to be able to connect the parts of the story. I think she is suggesting that people need their connections to parts of their own stories, be they connections to other people, places, material things, ideas, etc.

Susan's rope is her farm and her family; they are her responsibility and are therefore connected to one another. I get the feeling, though it is never stated outright, that Susan needs natural things to help her connect; she needs the slow but constant progress of the seasons and the different tasks required on the farm by each season and the progress of life (watching over her children as they grow up) to define herself.

Elizabeth Andrews:

The most significant moment of friendship that comes to mind is the episode as children where Jinny kisses Louis and Bernard chases after Susan because she is upset. This gets referred to over and over and over. It is a self-forming moment, like so many that occur during childhood, but the importance of it is in the interactions between Jinny, Louis, Susan, and Bernard.

Karin Westman:

Susan and Rhoda have come up so far as particular examples of characters needing or refusing "ropes": What about the other charatcers? Do they have particular "ropes" they hang on to or need, distinct from the others?

Karin Westman:

Good point about Rhoda, Amy: that she doesn't trust any of the ropes given by others. I don't think Louis does either, yes?

Nora Parrish:

I agree with you, Amy. Rhoda might have ropes floating around her in her private sea but she cannot believe that they are lifelines, and so she drowns herself (metaphorically speaking) in her unbelief.

Elizabeth Andrews:

I think that Bernard would cease to exist without his stories to tie everything together.

Amy Ketner:

Bernard uses words and stories as his rope that ties him to all humanity

John Brooks:

Along the lines of what Elizabeth wrote, and to answer Prof. Westman's second question, I think that we all have "ropes" in our lives, either physical "ropes" like friends or family members or non-physical "ropes" like a place we can go to in our mind or something like that that brings us out of the depths of despair. What's so interesting about this book is that it works much more like life than you think a book should: in real life, Percival would most likely not have died as a result of his being heroic. But in literature, at least until Woolf maybe, it would have been absolutely necessary to have him die as a hero b/c that's what people want. But our ropes in real life are often few and far between, and those that are there are often tattered and unraveling even as we grasp on to them.

Elizabeth Andrews:

I think John's right about making Percival die in a "normal" way. Perhaps dying heroically in a war is more the kind of death that people understand, though. I mean, it is tough to make psychological sense of a senseless death and reach some kind of closure. By not allowing for "heroic" closure, Percival's death means something totally different--something real.

Nora Parrish:

That's true, John. It seems like life never does what one expects it to but rather goes its own way and leaves us to deal with what it drops in our laps. Without our ropes, the things that are dropped in our laps are crushing. With a rope of some sort, at least we have a chance of not being crushed by life.

Karin Westman:

Yes, and even Bernard feels his words can be somewhat "tattered" too -- hwat keeps him going, then? What keeps him creating stories, even if they may not succeed?

John Brooks:

No, I don't think Louis trusts any of the ropes thrown to him either. He always seems on the outside of things, as if he is protecting some part of himself from being hurt by the rest of them.

Amy Ketner:

Louis is much like Rhoda in that he not only dosen't trust the ropes that others offer him but also dosent even trust himself enough to speak about what he feels or go with his own instincts. He has to look at others and copy what they are doing and saying so that he dosent stand out or appear any different. Bernard seems to have something that the others dont--some sort of strength---he realizes that his words may fail him sometimes--but his words are only one of the many ropes that he holds within his life and when his words do not work he has his wife--he has his friends--and as much as it may upset him that his words arent expressing life in the way he wishes them to at the time--he is able to move on until they once again do

Nora Parrish:

Bernard's stories are his ropes; even if they are tattered, they belong to him. He can trust his own creativity if nothing else in life. (It seems that his wife is also a rope for him--an attachment to someone else with whom he has things in common [which aren't made apparent but seem to exist from Bernard's way of speaking about his wife and the experience of marriage.

Karin Westman:

Do you all feel that Bernard kind of stands out formt he others in his ability to negotiate those ropes, the flux of experience? That words are being favored as a way to shape life?

Amy Ketner:

Yes, i feel he stands out. He uses what he possesses to make his life pleasant--or at least liveable.

Elizabeth Andrews:

Yes, I think that Bernard stands out. But it is because the novel culminates in his experience. I think that the creative outlet of words is embodied in him. So, ultimately it may not mean that he--the person--negotiated the ropes the best, but that imagination and the "kind" of life experience he had is the most rewarding.

Nora Parrish:

This is probably a stretch, but since we are talking about connections, it seems that Mrs. Wilcox's rope was Howards End itself; Meg Schlegel's her culture, Tibby's his academics, etc. I didn't really think of HE in terms of ropes before, although connection is central to it. I think you could look at many of the characters from the fiction we have studied and find their ropes as well.

Karin Westman:

Given that many critics have criticized this novel for being to "airy" and unattached to the world: Do you thik that material objects helpp or hinder characters' experiences? Are they ropes that tie too much? Or necessary ties, even if they bind?

Karin Westman:

Nora, the question then becomes whether any of the characters from _HE_ are too tightly caught to a certain rope? -- thinking of the Wilcoxes, for example.

Elizabeth Andrews:

We don't really get caught up in the material things in the book, I think, other than to recognize the characters individual desires and values. But the material elements are a hinderance, in a way, because they destract your attention from the "spiritual" level of perception.

Elizabeth Andrews:

I'm going to choke on all these cliche phrases.... :)

Nora Parrish:

Yes. Bernard seems to be the one who held up the best--Rhoda died a suicide, Susan faded off to death on her farm, Louis is still full of anxieties and insecurities, Jinny becomes pitiful, picking up one young man (gigolo?) after another to keep her sense of physical desirability, etc. But Bernard has his stable life, his wife, children, grandkids I assume, his house, his career--he has a place to return to. He seems to me to be the only one who found such a place.

Karin Westman:

Do the characters need material (as opposed to emotional) things, even if they're not emphasized to us? (Rhoda, or Jinny? Or Susan?)

Elizabeth Andrews:

And we should notice, I think, that Bernard's "place" as Nora describes it is to a large degree more traditional than where the others ended up. I mean he got what you are "supposed" to seek in life.

Amy Ketner:

SInce the world we exist in puts a large focus on material things, they, of course, play a role on the life of anyone--the book dosen't connect to the material aspects of life-- it seems that the reader gets a glimpse into the life of the charactors but not the entire picture becuase while we are in their minds while they jump from thought to thought there is a whole world that they are existing in with things all around them that the reader is not able to see or relate to the charactor.

Karin Westman:

On material needs: Check out Rhoda's comment on p.159 about needing to touch someting not to be blown through the corridors of time.

Elizabeth Andrews:

That passage would seem to suggest that material things are necessary ropes to tie us firmly to this ground, in this life. As opposed to getting carried away in the emotional or philosophical, or for that matter, the relational.

Amy Ketner:

Rhoda, more than the others, needed something other than humans--friends--people--to make the world liveable. She sought out anything unchanging to help her feel strong herself--and this of course could not be relationships--as they constantly change--it would have to be something like a brick or some stone.

Nora Parrish:

Yes, Mr. Wilcox is certainly obsessed with his rope (that green stuff $$$); he doesn't see things like Charles' struggles to support his growing family or the desperate nature of Bast's life on the edge of the abyss. Tibby too, is so caught up in the world of Oxford that he cannot see beyond it. Meg and Helen are also quite tied up to their world of culture and refinement, although Meg at least realizes that she is able to be in her world because of her family's wealth.

Anyway, I didn't mean to get so caught up in earlier writings. Elizabeth A., I noticed that as I was writing. A lot of people seem to think there's something wrong with that traditional sort of life. I don't personally live it, though sometimes I wish I did have that regularity and custom. But if the traditional home and family life is what satisfies someone, then why reject it just because it is traditional? I mean, Bernard appears quite contented with his life, or at least no more discontented that anyone else when old age arrives with the realization that the opportunities of youth have passed one by.

Karin Westman:

****As a final posting, offer these three items:

1. one theme that you think Woolf explores in the novel, 2. an example of it, and 3. say whether you think it's a theme of To the Lighthouse, too.

Elizabeth Andrews:

I think that connection between individuals through relationships AND through simple moments of "getting it" is a theme in this novel for sure. For instance, the way that all of the friends feel about Percival's departure and the moments of the dinner party where they seem to think the same thought--differently. To the Lighthouse presented the same theme, I think, in a slightly more direct light. THe ultimate question is the value that we put on "connecting" and who we surround ourselves with in life that could serve as our "ropes."

Elizabeth Andrews:

I feel like we have made great leaps on the road to discovering and conquering the meaning of life.... THis is exhausting!

Karin Westman:

..it is, isn't it?

Amy Ketner:

Human relationships and their role in life. Do they matter--do they uplift or tear down--does it depend on the individual? An example of a relationship that made a difference in the lives of Jinny, Susan, Rhoda, Bernard, Louis, and Neville is Percival. He came into the lives of the six friends and left footprints that remain throughout the years. I do think this theme exists in To The Lighthouse.

Nora Parrish:

I suppose I've been commenting around this for the last half hour but I think connection is a theme of The Waves: for example, the universal sense of loss after Percival's death. They had all lost the connection he provided and the necessity of forming some new connection was frightening. Connection is a fairly universal theme anyway, certainly also in To the Lighthouse, since Mrs. Ramsay's talent was connecting people, at least for the length of a dinner party, and, by the end of TTL, Lily wanted to learn how to connect the way Mrs. R. could.

Nora Parrish:

No kidding about the exhaustion--this is deep thought here!! :-)

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