Mrs. Dalloway by Virginia Woolf

"It was June. The King and Queen were at the Palace. And everywhere, though it was still so early, there was a beating, a stirring of galloping ponies, tapping of cricket bats; Lords, Ascot, Ranelagh and all the rest of it; wrapped in the soft mesh of the grey-blue morning air, which as the day wore on, would unwind them, and set down on their lawns and pitches the bouncing ponies, whose forefeet just struck the ground and up they sprung, the whirling young men, and laughing girls in their transparent muslins who, even now after dancing all night, were taking their absurd woolly dogs for a run; and even now, at this hour, discreet old dowagers were shooting out in their motor cars on errands of mystery; and the shopkeepers were fidgeting in their windows with their paste and diamonds, their lovely old sea-green brooches in eighteenth-century settings to tempt Americans (but one must economize, not buy things rashly for Elizabeth), and she, too, loving it as she did with an absurd and faithful passion, being part of it, since her people were courtiers once in the time of the Georges, she, too, was going that very night to kindle and illuminate; to give her party."
(Woolf, 5)

In this excerpt of Virginia Woolf's "Mrs. Dalloway", the author gives a full example of the free and direct discourse she is using to allow the opinions of both herself and Clarissa about the mundane to come through. Woolf has a tendency to list and repeat when speaking through Clarissa, while her own thoughts come through in the version of parenthesis and commas. The paragraph starts with Woolf, setting up the scene. "It was June. The King and Queen were at the Palace." (Woolf, 5). It goes on with Clarissa, listing what she sees and the days current events. " And everywhere,- eighteenth-century settings to tempt Americans" (Woolf, 5). Woolf interjects again with, "(but one must economize, not buy things rashly for Elizabeth)" (Woolf, 5). The paragraph ends with Clarissa again, "and she, too, loving it as she did with an absurd and faithful passion, being part of it, since her people were courtiers once in the time of the Georges, she, too, was going that very night to kindle and illuminate; to give her party." (Woolf, 5). This interruption of text is to emphasize the mundane, and shine light on the boredom the author and character alike are feeling. The punctuation, as well as the diction and syntax all play a role in the emphasis on the importance of overbearing boredom in day-to-day life. This paragraph in particular exposes just that.