"The Hours Analysis

Diego Arcos        

ENG 0100

Enrique Wong

06-10-2015

How the different personalities of Clarissa, Virginia and Laura led them into suicidal thoughts

The movie “The Hours” was a total example of how little facts in the life of a person affects into their heads and create really serious thoughts about suicide. A person could develop huge mental problems because his or her personal problems, like feeling lonely, being abused by someone else, not having a clear idea of who he or she is. That’s why talking about the lives of the woman in “The Hours” could help us to find out how important can be little facts that happens in normal life.

First let’s talk about the way that Virginia, Clarissa and Laura felt. Virginia was a married woman who thought she didn’t belong anywere, like she was overrunning in the world, on the contrary, we find Clarissa a self-confident women who loved being alive and had a perfect sense of who she was and where she belonged to, but she feels nostalgic about the love affair with her friend of the youth, Richard. As well as Virginia, is Laura who also had a deep depression but the difference with Virginia is that she tries to convince herself that everything is allright.

These 3 woman have a certain form to unburden from their torments. Lesbianism is one of the facts that they have in common, Virginia reveals her lesbianism while she is writing her book, same as Clarissa who lives with her partner Sally, and Laura who also reveals her lesbianism by trying to kiss her female friend. Because of this issue we can see that the problems they have in their lives are because of they are not identified with the way, that’s why they feel that pressure on her lives.

A point we should be aware of is the way they vent their problems. Clarissa on one hand relieves her worries by keeping her apartment beautiful, which is something she really loves, on the other hand, Virginia focusses her energy on writing in a form she can forget about problems, she lets her feelings be released in her book, almost likewise Laura who looks for comfort in books, coincidentally in one of Virginia’s books “Mrs. Dalloway” through reading she can get out of her life and concentrates in examine her own experiences.

To start talking about next point is important to say that most women in their generation used to marry young, most of them were not in love with their fiancés, but because of the commitment between two families they were in the obligation of getting married. Laura was one these women, she got married at a young age and also became a mother technically young, so she feels annoyed by the direction her life has taken, just as Clarissa who had a rush with Richard in her youth, and takes care of him because he contracted AIDS until he jumps from a window in her presence, in contrast Virginia and her deep contact with her emotions had led her to a mental illness, she is capable of seeing little details that other people would never be aware of, she perceives the world in such a profound way that she has gone mad.

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