Emotion+In+The+Room

Does anyone think the style of the novel greatly impacts the ability to portray emotion in the novel? For instance, by relating to all the events in such an indirect manner, on is almost distanced by this separation. To add to it all, using Jacob's Room to learn about him let's us see things through a very different light, but one the allows us to delve into the deep thoughts in his mind, and the underlying way of thinking, etc, not his current emotions. In fact, the room takes a little while to pass on to us what has happened in his mind, and this in my mind certainly takes away from Woolfe's ability to pass raw emotion to us the reader. Sure it's sad hearing about his death through his emptied room, as voids often create a very tangible sadness, but so does passion utterly crushed, and I think that's something Woolfe has lost. Anyone else agree or disagree? 1201959738

I disagree. I feel that we do get a good sense of what Jacob's emotions are. They might not be portrayed in the same way that we are used to, but they are there. At the end of chapter six is a good example of knowing what Jacob is feeling. He is confused. He doesn't know what to think of his and Florinda's relationship. I think this book was excellent at portraying emotion because not only did we get insight into Jacob's emotion, but into other character's emotions as well. When, in Chapter 4, Jacob and Timmy went to the Scilly Isles, we received insight into Clara's emotions as well. We learned how she loved Jacob. There were many emotions in this book, they were just not portrayed in a conventional way. We might not have been given every emotion that Jacob was feeling, but I don't think that was the purpose of the book. Woolf only gave us information that she felt was necessary. If a certain emotional was key to understanding Jacob, then she didn't put it in. She put in other character's emotions to help us understand how Jacob was perceived. She didn't give us every emotion, because not every emotion was necessary. 1201961498

I agree with AZU. We know that Woolf's style forces us to make inferences about Jacob because we mostly know him through other people and not through Jacob himself. When you don't know a person very well and you just hear about him/her through other people, it's hard to know exactly what they are feeling. The same goes for Jacob; since we do not know what he is thinking for the most part, we must make inferences on what he may be feeling, and those emotions that we inferred, if correct, are significantly dimmed down. But as to AZu's comment about Woolf losing the passion and emotions in the novel, I'm sure that she wanted it that way on purpose. She didn't lose it; she just never had it and never wanted it. 1201971032