Woolfian Boundaries - Clemson University

142 WOOLFIAN BOUNDARIES
would be on her knees—the Duke had died tragically at Woburn; Mrs Dolmetsch
would be telling how she had found her husband in bed with the parlour-maid.
(MOB 142)
In contrast, Bloomsbury, Monk’s House, and Charleston became associated with pastoral
and Shakespearian comedies, to Vanessa Bell she writes:
Nessa will come across with holes in her stockings—Quentin will come across
with a hole in his trousers. I shall think, “How Shakespeare would have loved
us!” for this sort of thing, the gramophone playing Mozart, the stars, the heat,
the combination of shabbiness and splendour. (L3 416)
Th e tragic mode was reserved for Woolf’s darker wishes. To Edward Sackville-West, she
writes: “your aunt’s behaviour could only be tolerated in an Elizabethan play. Th at she
may take a dagger to her own throat or drink broken glass is rather my hope, I admit”
(L3 458). As usual, Woolf is not content to follow the formula of each genre to the letter.
Th us, the melodrama at Hyde Park Gate is both amusing and revolting; the comedy of
manners is funny, but stifl ing; the Charleston and servant farces are witty, but irritating;
the tragedies are terrible, yet delightful.
Woolf enjoys her vantage point in the audience at these dramas and often takes a
comically obscene delight in the unfolding action:
Bloomsbury is ringing with two great excitements: 1: Julian Morrell is engaged
to a son of old Vinogradov: 2: Miss Bulley—the stormy petrel of revolution—is
engaged to her Cousin Armitage. You will be delighted to hear that Ottoline
and Philip are behaving scandalously…dislike the young man who is penniless;
and ignore the whole aff air. Julian is behaving with great spirit, and it is said that
Garsington presents a scene of unparalleled horror. Needless to say, I am going
to stay there. (L3 269)
However, Woolf’s position as audience member was perfected under duress. Her memories
of George Duckworth’s socializing when Woolf was in her teens left her feeling
as a tramp or gypsy must feel who stands at the fl ap of a tent and sees the circus
going on inside. Victorian society was in full swing; George was the acrobat who
jumped through hoops, and Vanessa and I beheld the spectacle. We had good
seats at the show, but we were not allowed to take part in it. We applauded, we
obeyed—that was all. (MOB 132)
However, the ability to observe serves a vital function in terms of her literature when an
event is translated from fi rst-hand experience to diary entry, to acquaintance via letter, to
public via novel. Woolf was as dependent on observation as she was on participation for
the creation of her lived reality.
Reading Woolf’s life through the framework of theatre presents a writer who was
keenly aware of life’s dramatic dimensions and of the self as performance; “a life-actor in