Virginia Woolf's creation of the novel's main character Orlando relies on a certain amount of "puns" to maintain her nature androgynous. But what is androgyny according to Woolf; to what extent does this gender mixing occur? When discussing distinct genres in any form of literature, there are some specific phrases and indeed some attributes that are usually reserved for one genre or another. It is precisely by mixing these words that Woolf manages to create an authentic air of androgyny: here the play on words is not a mere stylistic attribute, but a tool as necessary as grammar or sentence structure because it is the only thing capable to define intersexuality in the way Woolf desired. Say no to plagiarism. Get a tailor-made essay on "Why Violent Video Games Shouldn't Be Banned"? Get an original essay According to Woolf, Orlando was born and raised as a boy, “…there can be no doubt [of this].” However, later, in the first part of the novel, he is described in a very peculiar way; Orlando is described as having "eyes like soaked violets... [and] shapely legs." This is clearly a violation of the code of rigid gender roles! Because from that sentence you might think that we are describing a woman, not a man. In Western culture, shapely legs and beautiful eyes fall specifically into the realm of people who identify as women, and assuming one has spent any amount of time here in the West, it is readily apparent that the number of people who might use these characteristics to identify themselves while at the same time identifying as male are quite few. This therefore could simply be seen as a snippet of obvious foreshadowing of the morning when Orlando will wake up as a woman; at the same time it is part of Virginia Woolf's expression of her homosexual and emotional feelings towards Vita Sackville-West, as this book has been generally recognized as an extensive biography of Sackville-West's life in which Sackville-West is represented by Orlando. "Through the power of her pen, Woolf reversed the centuries-old Kentish law that had prevented Vita from inheriting Knole [her ancestral home]. In the pages of [Woolf's] Orlando, Vita Sackville-West owned Knole in a way that did not he never could in reality (DeSalvo, 205).' This sentence demonstrates how Virginia Woolf specifically integrated Vita's life and story into Orlando and Orlando's character. Here, normal patterns of behavior are avoided, such as the surprise of waking up as a member of the opposite sex of emotions that puts Orlando directly at loggerheads with normative patterns of behavior. Again and again it will create these situations where normal behavior is almost combated for example, when Nick Greene leaves Orlando and writes a scathing pamphlet about him, which causes a Orlando is in such pain that he "gives him the document at the end of a pair of tongs"; after ordering him to throw it into the dirtiest heart of the dirtiest dump on the estate' (Woolf), Orlando continues to pay him a quarterly pension any common sense, because who would continue to support someone who wrote something like that Virginia Woolf made many of her strongest sexual and emotional bonds with women throughout her life, and this is evident in many of her works, including? Orlando. , who was introduced to his longtime lover, Sackville-West. According to Sackville-West's son, Nigel Nicholson, the book was "literature's longest and most fascinating love letter (Smith, 60)". It has also been called a fairy tale a clef; a book inRoman clef is a "novel with a key", or a book that is a depiction of real events, but which is hidden behind a layer of metaphors or mislabeling. Fairy tales can often be seen as a magical fiction, a reality that, given certain allowances, otherwise acts realistically. From these two genres it can be seen that fairy key story is a way of doubly disguising the truth behind the story. This story, as previously mentioned, is a rough retelling of the life of Vita Sackville-West, who was very close to Woolf - hence the Roman key element; it's also set in a fantasy world where men can become women and live for unnatural lengths of time, hence the fairytale aspect. Furthermore, fairy tales usually tell us stories so that we learn a lesson: classic tales such as Little Red Riding Hood and Cinderella all contain multiple moralistic lessons, some not intended for children as we have been conditioned to believe in this age. Orlando similarly has a moral built into its rich narrative. The main message of the fairy tale that Orlando must convey to us concerns individuality. Orlando's character is certainly an individual, not conforming to many of the practices of the time. This fairy-tale nature of the story also allows for a great deal of creative wordplay, which carries both the story and the theme of alternative sexuality forward. Some examples of this play on words are found in the next paragraph. I have referred to the term "pun" numerous times thus far, but I have yet to provide a concrete example. If one were forced to choose a singular example by which to judge all other examples of so-called "punning" in Orlando, it would be this: "So Orlando stood watching while the man turned the pen between his fingers, this way and that there". way; and I looked and reflected; and then, very quickly, he wrote half a dozen lines and looked up. Whereupon Orlando, overcome by shyness, rushed away and reached the banquet hall just in time to fall to his knees and, bowing his head in confusion, to offer a bowl of rose water to the great Queen herself" (Woolf). This is an example of Orlando acting and fulfilling the gender role of a woman. Here are some points worth making: Orlando "looks" at a man, "looking" is not usually a term applied to one man looking at another; Orlando is also fulfilling a submissive, feminine role when he is 'overwhelmed by shyness' and 'falls to his knees and bows his head in confusion'. Both of the above quotes are not what we associate with the traditional, prototypical male: a male does not usually act in a way that puts himself "under" another person. So Orlando begins to think of himself as a woman, and Woolf makes this clear to us through her choice of words. «Orlando looked down at himself in a long mirror, showing no sign of discomfiture, and went, presumably, to his bathroom. We can take advantage of this pause in the story to make some statements. Orlando had become a woman, there was no denying it. But in every other respect Orlando remained exactly as it had been. The sex change, while altering their future, did absolutely nothing to alter their identity" (Woolf). Here's another quote, from the middle of Orlando's third chapter, that shows our protagonist's strong sense of identity and individuality. Obviously, a sudden, uninvited gender change would bother most people, but Orlando shows us such a sense of self through his calmness and regularity of his actions that we can't help but be slightly awed, which is partly the point of this story; if we are intimidated, then we can take it in:.