The Mrs. Dalloway Reader - (Virginia Woolf Library) by Virginia Woolf & Francine Prose (Paperback)

Book Synopsis

This first volume of its kind contains the complete text of and guide to Virginia Woolf's masterpiece, plus Mrs. Dalloway's Party and numerous journal entries and letters by Virginia Woolf relating to the book's genesis and writing. The distinguished novelist Francine Prose has selected these pieces as well as essays and appreciations, critical views, and commentary by writers famous and unknown. Now with additional scholarly commentary by Mark Hussey, professor of English at Pace University, this complete volume illuminates the creation of a celebrated story and the genius of its author.

Includes essays and commentary from:
Michael Cunningham
E. M. Forster
Margo Jefferson
James Wood
Mary Gordon
Elaine Showalter
Daniel Mendelsohn
Sigrid Nunez
Deborah Eisenberg
Elissa Schappell

From the Back Cover

"Mrs. Dalloway has branched into a book; and I adumbrate here a study of insanity and suicide: the world seen by the sane and the insane side by side--something like that. Septimus Smith?--is that a good name?--and to be more close to the fact than Jacob: but I think Jacob was a necessary step, for me, in working free. And now I must use this benignant page for making out a scheme of work." -- from The Diary of Virginia Woolf
Virginia Woolf's most intimate letters, journals, and essays surrounding the writing and publication of Mrs. Dalloway, including the novel itself and the companion book, Mrs. Dalloway's Party. Also included are essays by conteporary writers who have found inspiration in the work of Virginia Woolf. Now with a foreword and critical commentary by Woolf scholar Mark Hussey.
Virginia Woolf (1882-1941), one of the major literary figures of the twentieth century, transformed the art of the novel. The author of numerous novels, collections of letters, journals, and short stories, she was an admired literary critic and a master of the essay form. Mrs. Dalloway was first published in 1925.

Review Quotes

Praise for Mrs. Dalloway
"Mrs. Dalloway was the first novel to split the atom. If the novel before Mrs. Dalloway aspired to immensities of scope and scale, to heroic journeys across vast landscapes, with Mrs. Dalloway Virginia Woolf insisted that it could also locate the enormous within the everyday."
-Michael Cunningham, author of The Hours
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