Jacob's Room and repetition

It took reading the second half of Jacob’s Room to understand how to read and interpret the first half. I felt like I read the first half of the book without understanding any of it. I was lost. If someone had asked me to give a summary or make an outline without referring to any outside sources I would have been out of luck. All of the different perspectives that the novel was written in was threw me for quite a few loops. I finally broke the or at least one of the codes for reading and understanding Virginia Woolf-repetition.

Throughout the novel there are different forms of repetition. The first example that we spoke about in class was “Jacob! Jacob!” The importance behind the repetition of calling his name by his brother at the beginning of the novel did not strike me as unusual at first. It seemed like it’s only purpose and significance was his brother calling his name. However because I read the introduction, which gave a summary of the novel as well as insight on interpretations, details, and importance, I took this repetition as also asking where Jacob was. It stood as foreshadowing of Jacob’s life as he moved from place to place never seeming to settle or find happiness. He was a bit of a lost soul in my opinion. Also, this same repetition of his name was used again in the last page of the novel. After Jacob died his life long friend called his name in agony. This symbolized that Jacob never “found” himself in my opinion.

Florinda’s appearance was described in one chapter. Part of the description included her shoe have, “silver buckled toe” which was also used in one of her other works, Kew Gardens. Its usage in that short story still is a mystery to me. In Jacob’s Room it was used to describe her shoes. I do not think that it was a coincidence. The only interpretation or insight that I have been able to come up with is this, in both stories it seemed to have a negative connotation.

Another form of repetition that I noticed was a way of changing perspectives. An event or situation would be described in one person’s perspective then it was repeated through the eyes of another person. At first I thought this was just her stream of consciousness on paper but, I noticed it was being used to inform the reader that the perspective had just been changed. I am absolutely amazed with the ingenuity of Virginia Woolf. She found a way to put the ways the human mind works on paper. She writes in a “stream of conscience” but includes patterns such as the importance of repetition, which allows slower and more average individuals like myself to better follow and understand the story line.

I think of her usage of repetition as the keyword to decipher a code. Or at least, that is what it has served as for me. I hope to study her usage of repetition more closely throughout the rest of the semester. Without it in Jacob’s Room I know I would have been discouraged and lost.