The UVic Writer's Guide


Stream-Of-Consciousness Narration


Stream-of-consciousness narration is a variant of the limited third-person point of vew; the narrator relates only what is experienced by a character's mind from moment to moment, presenting life as thought process, or interior monologue. More precisely, "stream of consciousness" refers to any lengthy passages of introspection in literature; whereas "interior monologue" denotes a narrative entirely in a wandering, introspective style.

James Joyce's Ulysses (1922) experiments in types of stream-of-consciousness narrative, while Virginia Woolf's Mrs. Dalloway (1925) is an example of a series of interior monologues:

It seemed to her as she drank the sweet stuff that she was opening long windows, stepping out into some garden. But where? The clock was striking--one, two, three: how sensible the sound was; compared with all this thumping; like Septimus himself. She was falling asleep.


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Copyright, The Department of English, University of Victoria, 1995
This page updated September 23, 1995