Connection, Identity, and Septimus

The question that we were asked in class considering how Septimus and Clarissa Dalloway's paths cross is interesting, because it takes two different worlds and puts them on the same wavelength. The idea that Septimus Smith, who has PTSD, and Clarissa, who is a high-class woman, is strange. However, one way that they connect, but also that several other characters connect as well is through purpose.

This purpose is what they either see themselves as having or in some way struggling to find. In several different places, we see people who have a fairly well-conceived notion of what they are meant to do, while in other places, we see people struggling over what they are meant to be doing with their lives.

Septimus' purpose is very self-defined, as the narrator mentions within the book. He creates this sense of purpose himself, through suggestions to him by hallucinations he gets while he is in the park. His purpose is to transfer certain ideals of reality to the Prime Minister. While this is very focused around his disability and may not be considered a valid source of information, one's purpose is not told to them, but is conceived by them. In this way, it is still valid.

For Clarissa, she mainly develops this sense of purpose throughout the novel. We see near the end that she comes to the conclusion that she is there to collect people, bring people together through her parties which Peter sees as frivolous.

Speaking of Peter, he seems to struggle with coming back from India. He thinks as he walks how society has moved on while he has been away in India, marrying and then unmarrying, doing whatever else he did while there, while in London, all people have settled into a routine that he hasn't been a part of, making him detached from all that goes on there. One example of this is his going to the party, and immediately regretting it, because he didn't know anyone. His purpose now from leaving India is up in the air.

Finally, there is Elizabeth. She is different from the others that I have mentioned in that she has not had the life yet to choose and create a path for herself to follow. She is only turning 18, and she is being confronted with the future, and more specifically with the changes that have taken place over the time her mother has been alive. Mrs. Kilman frustrates this further, by bringing to the forefront all the things she could be.

All of these different scenarios depict the same theme: purpose and finding that purpose. At the forefront is Clarissa, with her fairly clear idea of what it is she must do in life. Next is Peter, whose life has been backtracked in a place he now has no connection to, and at the bottom is Elizabeth, who is beginning her trek through adulthood and is only at the moment gathering together ideas. Another player that rocks this boat is Septimus, who also has these feelings, despite being mentally challenged. He provides a sort of view from both sides of the spectrum, while not really being part of it. This is how Septimus, Clarissa, as well as many other's thoughts resonate in sync.