"The Hours" Passage Explication

Love in Detail

…here the drug dealers (would they kill you if it came to that?) and the lunatics, the stunned and baffled, the people whose luck, if they ever had any, has run out. Still, she loves the world for being rude and indestructible, and she knows that other people must love it too, poor as well as rich, though no one speaks specifically of these reasons. Why else do we struggle to go on living, no matter how compromised, no matter how harmed? Even when we’re further gone than Richard; even if we’re fleshless, blazing with lesions, shitting in the sheets; still, we want desperately to live. It has to do with all this she thinks. Wheels buzzing on concrete, the roil and shock of it; sheets of bright spray blowing from the fountain as young shirtless men toss a Frisbee and vendors (from Peru, from Guatemala) send pungent, meaty smoke up from their quilted carts; old men and women straining after the sun from their benches, speaking softly to each other… (The Hours, 14-15)


In this passage from The Hours, author Michael Cunningham depicts the main reason why Clarissa Vaughn enjoys life so much and why, in the end, she decides to keep on living. Unlike Richard, who fails to see the beauty in life, Clarissa notices that the true splendor of existence can be attributed to the little and often ordinary details one encounters daily.

The narration in this passage, which comments on life from Clarissa’s point of view, depicts Clarissa’s immense love for life by first establishing that all people, regardless of how life treats them, wish to live. The narration states that Clarissa “knows that other people must love [life] too” as much as she does. The method by which Clarissa is able to convince herself of this in the passage is through a rhetorical question, asking, “why… struggle to go on living” even if we are completely mistreated by life? To further Clarissa’s belief, the narration cites Richard as evidence and comments that even Richard, who is in a desperate and grim sate, chooses to live. Clarissa believe this is must be so because even he enjoys some aspects of life. This logical approach to the situation convinces Clarissa that all people love life on the fundamental level, for who would suffer through all its misery, she thinks, when the option to end it is so available?

For Clarissa specifically in this passage, what makes the miserable parts of getting up in the morning endurable are all the little details of everyday life that surround us. After convincing herself that all people must love life, the narration, through Clarissa’s point of view, begins to describe Clarissa’s current surroundings. The narration depicts the normal and often overlooked parts of daily city life such as the “wheels buzzing on concrete.” Normally, one would not think twice of such noise, but Clarissa adores the “roil and shock of it.” Along with admiring the mundane noises of daily life, Clarissa also takes joy in the sight of “young shirtless men toss[ing] a Frisbee” and the smell of “pungent, meaty smoke” coming from vendors’ carts. Through the use of such imagery- imagery that has the reader hearing and smelling the overwhelming sounds and spicy tastes of the city -the narration is able to project Clarissa’s outlook on life and also appreciate the beauty in the little details of it onto the reader.

In this passage, Cunningham is able to characterize Clarissa Vaughn and answer why she loves life so much. In doing so, he also answers why Mrs. Dalloway, from Virginia Woolf’s novel with the same name, enjoys life as much as she does. Cunningham both show’s Clarissa’s belief that regardless of the position one has in life, there are always positives to be seen in the minute and everyday, and is also able to engulf the reader in this feeling with his use of extraordinary description.

Comments

  1. AnonymousJuly 12, 2012 at 1:41 PM

    Hey, I was searching for writing on Borges to help me understand "El evangelio" better and stumbled across your blog. It really helped! Thanks. I love Pride and Prejudice and The Hours so I checked out your entries on those too. They're great! Just thought I'd let you know...

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