A Psychoanalytic Interpretation On The Themes Of Life And Death In In Mrs. Dalloway

Virginia Woolf is one of the greatest female writers in the human history. As the spokeswoman for the stream-of-consciousness novels, she constantly focuses her attention on the life and death of human beings, spending her whole life in exploring the meaning of life."What is life?" It is a question that runs through all the works of Virginia Woolf. Her exploring of the meaning of life is quite unique, deep-thinking and thought-provoking.Mrs. Dalloway is one of the masterpieces of Virginia Woolf. Different from traditional novel writing skills, Woolf applies a characteristic writing technique in the novel. She advocates the exploration of the inner life of the main characters whose destiny can be revealed by depicting the characters’intricate impressions and changing moods. The delicate descriptions of the main characters’minds can be analyzed by the Freudian psychoanalytical theories, which offer the readers a fresh perspective in interpreting the novel. The meaning of life can be revealed by analyzing the characters’sudden epiphany towards "life" and "death". By applying Freudian psychoanalytical theories, this thesis intends to analyze the main characters’ outlook on life and death, and the underlying reasons of their different destiny, furthermore, to explore Woolf’s own view towards life and death.