The "Friend" Becomes the Enemy

 One thing that was very interesting in this book was the portrayal of Dr. Holmes and how he represents society dealing with mental health in this time. From the beginning, we can tell that he is completely ignoring Septimus' problems and obvious illness and is saying that it can be cured with "bed rest". I think that with Virginia Woolf's personal experiences with mental illness throughout her life definitely makes her more than adequate to make this commentary on how people have dealed with this problem throughout history. An especially traumatizing touch on this is how Holmes is the one who eventually drives Septimus to commit suicide. When Septimus realizes that he is here, that is when he starts going crazy, which eventually culminates with him killing himself. The actual words that she uses to describe this are very scary in themselves: "But it was too late now. Holmes was coming.". It makes me feel like I am reading some kind of horror movie instead of a story about 20th century English life. It obviously sets the "good guy" and the "bad guy" so that we can understand Septimus, perhaps how she would have wanted to be understood.

Comments

  1. Katya S.October 18, 2020 at 4:12 AM

    I think this is especially interesting if you have watched "The Hours". In that film, Woolf seeks to defy doctors and even wants to return to London despite the doctors ordering her to stay in the small town. She even said that if she had to choose between staying and dying, she would choose death. Although "The Hours" is obviously a film and Woolf's character may differ from what Woolf was really like, it seems like Woolf may have taken her frustrations out on Dr. Holmes. Just like how everyone thought that what the doctors said was helping Woolf (even though she hated it), Rezia thought Dr. Holmes was helping and it seems like Dr. Holmes himself also believed that. For me," Mrs. Dalloway" seems like a commentary on the state of mental health at the time.

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  2. YeowoonOctober 21, 2020 at 9:57 PM

    Yeah I also found it interesting how Dr. Holmes was portrayed in context of the society at the time and its views on mental illness. Dr. Holmes was supposed to help Septimus but instead basically became the reason for his death. Well, actually I wouldn't say that he was the sole reason for why Septimus committed suicide but he was the trigger. Anyways, I agree in that maybe Virginia Woolf could have expressed her own experience with mental illness in Septimus' experience.

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