- Illness
‘Once rheumatic, always rheumatic, I fear,’ he replied ‘To some extent it depends on the weather, though not so much as people are apt to think.’ / ‘One does not die for it, at any rate.’ Said Helen
‘The people in ships, however, took an equally singular view of England. Not only did it appear to them to be an island, and a very small island, but it was a shrinking island in which people were imprisoned…. Finally, when the ship was out of sight of land, it became plan that the people of England were completely mute. The disease attacked other parts of the earth; Europe shrank, Asia shrank, Africa and America shrank
‘But a disease had broken out in the East, there was cholera in Russia…’ – Mr Dalloway
Fifield:
‘Describing a journey of self-realization, culminating in and curtailed by the death of the heroine, Rachel Vinrace, from a tropical fever, the novel reproduces the author’s own experience of a path to maturity interrupted by illness and death’
Paley ‘people will drink the water’ – warning against typhoid
The Voyage Out prepares the ground for the visionary landscapes described in On Being Ill
Exotic illness – colonialism – ‘exotic adventure novel’
‘an environment hostile at a microbial as well as a cultural level’ – Michael North, Reading 1922: epidemic was, by 1922, one of the ‘cliches of tropical exploration’
Coloniser conflated to the role of hero in overcoming illness
‘Mackenzie, the famous explorer, had died of fever some ten years ago, almost within reach of civilisation – Mackenzie, he repeated, the man who went farther inland than anyone’s been yet’ – reference to death of Dr David Livingstone in 1873 from dysentery and malaria in the hut of Chief Chitambo’s village in Zambia
The death is noble: ‘but here was a man who he would willingly have known; and he was strangely affected by the thought of his lonely death, and his grave in the midst of the Dark Continent he loved so well’
Leonard Woolf: ‘The Village in the Jungle’
In Austen’s novels – which Wollaeger argues are the clear intertextual pole of TVO – none of the innumerable illnesses to befall the heroines culminate in death – Rachel’s death is a deviation
Sickness – self-alienation
- Time
- Consciousness
Stream of consciousness – omniscient narrator
Opening paragraphs of first and last chapters illustrate the tension implicit in the novel’s form – in part a novel of manners and also in part a Bildungsroman
Chapter 1 begins as a novel of manners, light and ironic, whereas Chapter 27 begins in a tone of almost metaphysical weight
Concerns are metaphysical
- Women
Although Helen is first introduced in the novel, The Voyage Out is truly about her niece Rachel. At the beginning of the text, she is presented as an unintelligent and ignorant character. Helen thinks that she might be interesting if she "were ever to think, feel, laugh, or express herself." Encouraged by Rachel's father, Helen invites Rachel on the trip to South America and attempts to help her grow and progress as an intelligent woman.
Throughout the trip, Rachel is confronted with different people, challenging events and critical discussions. For example, Helen and Hirst encourage Rachel to think critically about her religious faith, and question why she thinks the way she does. Although she does learn from her teachers, Rachel also learns what not to do from Helen and Hirst. This is because Rachel believes they have an over-reliance on their intellect, and therefore are not living a full life. When Rachel confronts Helen about this matter, she acts "as if she rather enjoyed the attack." As such, we get the impression that Helen is glad that Rachel is showing strength and independence in her assertions.
Although Rachel becomes more independent throughout the journey, she is not immune from the oppression of marriage. She believes that she has found a good match in Hewet, who is emotionally perceptive and kind. However, when they are engaged, he becomes more controlling. He believes that she reads "trash," and tells her what she ought to read instead, and insists that she plays the piano when he wants her to. As such, Rachel begins to feel stifled by her relationship with Hewet, and we see some of the issues that women suffered within marriages in the early 20th Century.