MODERNIZME GEÇİŞ: VIRGINIA WOOLF’UN NIGHT AND DAY ROMANINDA ROMANS GELENEĞİNİN VE REALİZMIN YIKIMI
EXPERIMENTAL MODERNISM: THE SUBVERSION OF ROMANCE FORMULAS AND THE DISMANTLING OF REALIST REPRESENTATION OF THE CITY IN VIRGINIA WOOLF’S NIGHT AND DAY

Summary/Abstract: Virginia Woolf’s second novel, Night and Day (1919), has generally been conceived as a typical example of the traditional English novel, which is characterized by the realistic rendering of common life and ordinary people. Some aspects of the book such as chronological order, omniscient narrator, and the traditional plot of love and marriage undoubtedly point to the realist tradition that the novel resides in. However, it is misleading to evaluate the text simply as a realist work because the narrative strategies Woolf employs throughout the book subvert the earlier literary conventions and signal the commencement of modernist literature that has changed the form and content of the English novel in the following decades. Throughout this work, Woolf questions both social and literary conventions by subverting romance formulas and describing psychologically-perceived London. While the subverted romance structure exposes the established views on gender and marriage, the portrayal of London through the consciousness of the characters prevents the novel from being a wholly realist work. The aim of this paper is to analyze how Woolf challenges traditional form and subject matter, and hence lays the ground for her later modernist works.

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