“I am certain I’m going mad again".
These striking phrases are the last written words of 59 year old Virginia Woolf that echo throughout literary history as a reflection of her profound psychological pain and provide a window into the wrecked and often misunderstood nature of the human psyche. Virginia Woolf was a feminist pioneer within this field, dramatically changing the way that literature will be experienced well into the future. Her true genius is her range; her ability to connect to both academic researchers and typical average everyday readers. She did not write simply to prove her superior understanding over a few elite people, she found a huge range of ways in her writing to help all people experience something new about their own mind through ‘quiet madness’.
Virginia Woolf dealt with serious mental distress throughout her entire life and rather than staying away from the feelings, she incorporated the honest experience to an almost uncomfortable level in her writing. She used methods such as stream of consciousness and different views of a single event, as well as a non-linear view of time, to challenge the very framework of how traditional stories unfold.
In producing her work, she disproved the assumption that world literature is only available in institutional academic spaces and instead demonstrated that it can exist within everyday thought processes, in people's homes and family lives. These beliefs were not restricted to her writings, as in 1917, she and her husband, Leonard Woolf, created the Hogarth Press, allowing her to gain access to independent publishing and to support the works of authors whose writings are typically excluded from mainstream publishers. Thus, Woolf's struggles were not solitary; her anxieties regarding the impact of World War II on her mental well being added to her psychological distress, and in 1941, fearing her mental breakdown would once again begone to occur, she committed suicide, leaving behind a legacy that is just as substantial and multilayered as her life.
Woolf’s writing lingers with many because of the presentation of her thoughts and how each thought is felt, not read. Reading Woolf feels less like reading a book and more like jumping into a person's mind and seeing how disordered, disjointed and chaotic thoughts really are. Furthermore, you are forced to face the fact that there is nothing rational about the human mind, that it does not always possess the capability of being stable, and which is the hardest of all to admit; our minds exhibit far less control than we typically would like to accept. Woolf’s work is dramatic and provides insight into those who are constantly told, ‘Just keep it all together,’ and ‘You have to act tough.’ In contrast, the experience Woolf provides through her use of structure, tension, and framework create space for chaos, exposure, and incoherence; therefore creating the ability for her work to possess such a profound sense of authenticity.
As an audience, we often get struck by how easily we overlook other peoples’ internal battles just because they are not visible. We often empathize with physical pain, yet for some reason, we either simplify or ignore mental anguish; Woolf depicts this missing link with unflinching honesty. It’s extremely unsettling when you see parts of your own mental processes reflected in her work, yet there’s something strangely reassuring about it too, it reassures you that your experiences are not your own, that they existed well before you did, and that people have felt them just as deeply.
Even now, in the 21st century Virginia Woolf continues to hold relevance, not for what she provides, but for the questions she asks about reality, time, identity and the human mind. She changed the world of literature forever, and in doing so, changed how we understand our own thinking. Perhaps the most powerful part of her legacy is how she didn’t just create more complexity in the world of literature, but rather induced a level of honesty that was never before experienced.
-Isha Barve and Vedashree Agnihotri
