Everyone strives to live a happy life. However, according to Sigmund Freud’s Civilization and Its Discontents, happiness is an unattainable goal for mankind. In her novel, Mrs. Dalloway, Virginia Woolf continues this discussion through her stream-of-consciousness narrative depicting a day in the life of a social elite, Clarissa Dalloway. Through constant inner monologues of the characters, Woolf is able to make astute observations on happiness in a classist society, and particularly on how Clarissa Dalloway and other characters finds happiness (or lack thereof) in their lives. Woolf begs the question as to whether or not one can be truly happy in a society that feeds on hiding ones true self behind the label of a certain class built on foundations of extreme privacy and lack of significant connections. Freud dictated the three most prominent causes of unhappiness in his work entitled Civilization and Its Discontents: “We are threatened with suffering from three directions: from our own body, which is doomed to decay and dissolution and which cannot even do without pain and anxiety as warning signals; from the external world, which may rage against us with overwhelming and merciless forces of destruction; and finally from our relations to…show more content… What it means to be happy holds different meanings throughout time however the inability to reach a climatic happiness is one that has remained consistent as a result of the barriers society has placed on us. We all have an intrinsic desire for happiness and it is this motivation that allows us to live fully, always searching and hoping for happiness. However, society places rules on us that even further limit our ability to successfully search for happiness. Woolf’s depiction of Clarissa Dalloway, Peter Walsh, and Rezia’s thoughts throughout the day lend further support to Freud’s belief that it truly is civilization which causes us the most discontent in our
