Masculinity and Trauma in Mrs. Dalloway
In Mrs. Dalloway, we are given the character of Septimus Smith, a man who has been broken by his experiences in war. There have been several suggestions in class, correctly, I believe, that part of his severe disorder lies in the culture of masculinity that pervaded England of the 1920s, and still pervades our modern culture (to an admittedly lesser degree).
Certainly, his ultimate suicide is caused by a male doctor failing to understand Septimus’ condition, and in the end, accusing him of “cowardice”, a ludicrous claim to make against a man who fought in the bloodiest war any character in the book has ever seen (with the exceptions of any very small children). Why is he accused of cowardice? Because he kills himself rather than once again bury his emotions, this time on the orders of a doctor, who spends his time essentially advocating that Septimus spend his time pretending that everything is alright, even when it clearly is not.
However, to me, it seems that toxic masculinity is not the proximate cause of Septimus’ initial lack of response to Evans’ death (whether it is a longer term cause seems to me to be likely). When Evans dies, he and Septimus have been serving together for 3 or 4 years, depending on when they arrived on the front. Presumably, Septimus has seen fellow men in his unit, other friends of his, die in great numbers before. He has grown used to death among his friends, and like many others, no longer reacts to it. But why does he stop reacting? I think that he stops reacting because he has already been deeply traumatized. His non-reaction is a defensive mechanism, designed to prevent him from getting hurt. This reaction is not unique to Septimus, plenty of others of his generation, and many others, have had the same reaction to war or other serious trauma.
This mechanism, as we can see, fails completely. As the war ends, he begins to reconsider his trauma, and, with greater distance, the mechanism breaks down. He remembers how he felt before the war, and begins attempting to figure out why he can no longer feel that way. Instead of protecting him, the mechanism in fact hurts him further. We see him feel increasingly alienated from the world around him, not feeling human in the end.
Septimus’ complete collapse in the end, therefore, seems to be a combination of these two factors. The toxic masculinity of 1920s England, a nation clueless as to how to deal with huge numbers of young men like Septimus, combined with severe trauma, produces the Septimus who, in the end, is killed by a doctor who seems to me to be attempting to get Septimus to relive one of the most disturbing episodes in his life, when he realizes that it is absolutely not normal, not something that he can see as human, that he cannot feel for the death of his close friend.
This kind of connects with what we talked about in class today about Septimus suffering from "survivor's guilt." I think that Septimus is unable to react to Evans' death because he is unable to talk about it. To some degree, there is some toxic masculinity here because Septimus felt that he had to prove himself as a man by going to war so naturally he feels like he shouldn't convey his emotions and feelings about his friend's death. I agree with your idea of how repressing his emotions could be a defensive mechanism, but I think toxic masculinity plays a role as well, especially since we know about his backstory and how he chose to join the war to prove himself as a man.
ReplyDeleteI really like that you think he stopped feeling sorrow at his comrades deaths prior to Evans, but didn't notice it until Evans died. But, he is not being told to bury his emotions, he just loses them when there is too much happening around him, at least that's how I understood it. But I think that the toxic masculinity and Dr. Holmes being the straw that broke the camels back are completely correct.
ReplyDeleteI agree that this type of trauma would cause you to develop a coping mechanism, which Septimus experienced as numbness. What I find interesting about Septimus in particular, is his detached awareness of his issue. He is capable of the self reflection to realize that he has changed and that something is not right, but as we discussed, he has a hard time articulating it. The lack of knowledge at the time may have contributed to his inability to understand his own trauma, but also his fear about the unknown problem within him contributes to his preexisting anxiety from the war.
ReplyDeleteI agree with your analysis of Septimus's death and I like how you pointed out how we as readers should not look just to Evan's death, but a culmination of factors to understand Septimus's mental status. However, I don't think the doctor is trying to get Septimus to relive his war memories, but instead trying to make Septimus forget about and put the horrors of war behind him. I think the doctor exacerbated Septimus's inability to move and cope with these feelings and accelerated the demise of Septimus's mental stability.
ReplyDeleteWhile the culture around masculinity certainly played a big part in Septimus' suicide, I don't think and one person, or even the whole of 1920's England can be put to blame. The culture and psychology that the doctors followed were built on 100's of years of prior history. The doctors in the book were really just following what they know and probably really wanted to help Septimus get better, its just that the knowledge to properly treat him wasn't there.
ReplyDeleteI definitely agree that masculinity combined with Septimus' severe trauma is what led to his death. Going through what Septimus went through, it makes sense that he would eventually develop a defense mechanism to stop himself from continuing to get hurt. However, I think gender roles and his doctor's encouraging him to keep his feelings inside made things worse for him after the war. he gets married because he cant feel anything, and continuously struggles to convey his emotions to his wife and doctors, which I think is a combination of severe trauma as well as toxic masculinity making him repress his emotions.
ReplyDeleteI think this makes a lot of sense as something to explain Septimus. Toxic masculinity could not have caused Septimus's death by itself, and the idea of a severe trauma in his life having this effect makes a lot of sense. A subconscious reaction to prevent himself from getting hurt more after witnessing a lot of death in the war seems logical, and the cause of its breakdown is equally sensible. When brought out of the war to his home and a normal life, Septimus begins to wonder why he doesn't feel the same as he did before the war. The only way the mechanism worked was because it was in an unusual setting that required constant focus. Without a constant distraction, Septimus had the time to do other things and allow his thoughts to come forward. With more time alone, Septimus can't prevent himself from thinking about these events and not being able to feel.
ReplyDeleteTrue I don't think only toxic masculinity could have caused Spetimus to kill himself but I do think it was the leading factor. Toxic masculinity is what caused him to turn off his emotion when his friend Evans died. Although I am sure he saw many other people die as well in the war he was most likely more detached from them because they were just fellow comerads and not he best friend. I think the deaths of his comerads could have slowly been numbing him and Evans death might have been the final blow. But isn't this numbing due to toxic masculinity? The reason he became numb to them is because he was told to and when Evans died he turned off his emotion completely.
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