WGST 340
The Fiction of Virginia Woolf Fall 2009
Division II Writing Skills
Cross-listed ENGL 340
This is not the current course catalog

“Let us record the atoms as they fall upon the mind in the order in which they fall, let us trace the pattern, however disconnected and incoherent in appearance, which each sight or incident scores upon the consciousness. Let us not take it for granted that life exists more fully in what is commonly thought big than in what is commonly thought small” (“Modern Fiction”). Virginia Woolf’s fiction represents a self-conscious and highly experimental challenge to the conventions of Victorian and Edwardian fiction. This course will explore her efforts to bridge the gap between experience and its representation in language by following the evolution of her innovative narrative techniques for portraying consciousness, memory, selfhood, relationships, and community. Along the way, we will consider Woolf’s challenges to stable gender roles and her reconception of women’s positions as creators. We will read most of the major novels, including The Voyage Out, Jacob’s Room, Mrs. Dalloway, To the Lighthouse, The Waves, and Between the Acts, together with selected short fiction and critical essays by Woolf and her contemporaries, and more recent critical work on Woolf.