Vol. 43 No. 4 1976 - page 560

560
PARTISAN REVIEW
still exhibits a basic narrative interest (perhaps
Finnegan 's Wake,
a fictional
cosmos unto itself, could be considered an exception) which is almost en–
tirely lacking in Woolf's. However complicated the point of view and richly
patterned the symbolic structure, their novels essentially remain part of a
story-telling tradition from which Woolf dissociated herself. We are im–
pelled through
Ulysses
less by its dazzling virtuosity than its abiding concern
for Leopold and Stephen and what befalls them, just as we are absorbed in
the destinies of Paul Morel or Decoud or Lord Jim or Benjy or even Winnie
Verloc as they go about their muddled business. Although they do so in a
variety of innovative ways, the great modern novels of the twentieth century
implicate the reader in the lives of their characters as they confront experi–
ence, and in the problems of choice and self-definition that confrontation
engenders. " Yes-oh dear yes," E.M. Forster writes in
Aspects ofthe Novel
with bemused resignation, " the novel tells a story." Subtilized and inter–
nalized though it is, the primitive energy of the story
animat~s
most of
modern fiction .
Woolfs novels , however, contain no substantial narrative impulse. In
a very real sense it is true she does write novels in which nothing happens.
It
would be impossible, for example, to speak in any serious way about the
sustained "action" of
The Waves
or
Between the Acts,
or even of a more
manageable novel like
To The Lighthouse.
Her work contains little humor ,
passion , or particular dramatic or even ideological tension . Demanding
everything and making few concessions to readers, it seems to many hermet–
ically sealed in its austerity and fragility from the vital currents of life. Woolf
recognized, of course, that in writing novels that lacked any strong narrative
thread she was cutting herself off from one of the enduring appeals of fic–
tion, but she had no difficulty making this choice.
As an artist Woolf was obsessed with what we can call formal rather
than thematic concerns, with finding ways of embodying, as she says in her
diary, " the exact shapes my brain holds. " That Woolf was absorbed primar–
ily in creating shapes is what makes her such an utterly original voice in
modern literature.
It
is also what makes her such a difficult writer to talk
about, for her work does not readily lend itself
to
critical analysis of charac–
ter or theme or philosophy . The difficulties are not simply ours: certainly
Woolfs own language fails when she tries to formulate for herself her fic–
tional intentions. Reflecting in her diary on Arnold Bennett's criticism that
Jacob 's Room
doesn ' t have characters that survive, Woolf agrees that she
hasn't " that 'reality' gift. I insubstantiate willfully to some extent, dis–
trusting reality-its cheapness. But to get further . Have I the power of
conveying the true reality ." If distinctions between 'reality' and 'true
reality' are seldom satisfying, this at least has the virtue of suggesting what
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