Mrs. Dalloway

“I give it to you!”

One of the most moving characters for me would be that of Septimus. A shell shocked former soldier, Septimus is forced to face the harshness of reality through his inability to feel and his marriage to Rezia. After several doctors and psychologists visitations, Septimus is ultimately given the choice of ending his life or surrendering it completely to the hands around him. He chooses suicide. Throughout the novel, each character longs for their own sense of privacy. Be it Clarissa wandering through her house during her own party or Peter Walsh following the woman around the park instead of approaching his forthcoming thoughts of death. And in a sense through Septimus throwing himself out of the window he is entirely in his private world. He no longer was going to allow doctors of lovers to enter that state of mind, and despite this being a public act he is not surrendering to anyone else. As he disembarks from life he shouts out, “I give it to you!”, which demonstrates his refusal to give his soul to Sir Williams or Dr. Holmes through the first person. He choose his destiny, sick of allowing other people to tell him what to think or feel.

Septimus’s death opens the eyes of the other characters. They each have their own opinion and thoughts about death that is constantly beating their brains. Clarissa is constantly thinking back to the moment at Bourton when she and Sally were so content with life that they would be satisfied to die in that moment. This memory is stamped on her brain and causes her to question the life that she has chosen, and she sees Septimus’s death as a communication to these thoughts, indirectly connecting to him. Overall I really enjoyed the novel.