Virginia Woolf's matriarchal family of origins in 'Between the Acts.'

Twentieth Century Literature, Summer, 1993 by Patricia Cramer

penitentiaries. In terms of the suffering and frustration that they

spread about them there is probably no comparison. There is

very possibly at least as great a degree of mental warping. Yet

they are entrusted with positions of great importance and are as

a rule fathers of families. Their impress both upon their own

children and upon the structure of our society is indelible. They

are not described in our manuals of psychiatry because they are

supported by every tenet of our civilization. They are sure of

themselves in real life in a way that is possible only to those who

are oriented to the points of the compass laid down in their own

culture. Nevertheless a future psychiatry may well ransack our

novels and letters and public records for illumination upon a

type of abnormality to which it would not otherwise give

credence. In every society it is among this very group of the

culturally encouraged and fortified that some of the most

extreme types of human behaviour are fostered. (277) Like Woolf, Benedict studied culture hoping for "a reinstating and reshaping of the spiritual values of existence" ("Science" 648), and she counted on outsiders, like herself, to challenge the destructive norms of her civilization.

The most important similarity in Benedict's Patterns of Culture and Woolf's Between the Acts is their common focus on fundamental configurations as the key to understanding a culture. In Patterns Of Culture Benedict argues that underlying configurations or patterns organize all levels of life in accordance with selected values or goals. She writes that "The significant sociological unit . . . therefore, is not the institution but the cultural configuration," and that cultures are "not merely heterogeneous assortments of acts and beliefs. They have certain goals toward which their behavior is directed which their institutions further" (244). The unconscious aims of a culture will channel all aspects of social life toward these unconscious cultural intentions: "All the miscellaneous behavior directed toward getting a living, mating, warring, and worshipping the gods, is made over into consistent patterns in accordance with unconscious canons of choice that develop within the culture" (48). Benedict insists that external controls have far less effect on determining group formation than internal controls. She writes, "What really binds men together is their culture--the ideas and the standards they have in common" (16). Her idea of configuration linked group structures with the attitudes and beliefs underlying them and provided a key to discovering the fundamental mind-set of a culture which manifests itself in social behavior.

In Between the Acts Woolf investigates the "values and ideas" which draw people toward Giles in order to pinpoint the qualities which contribute to war and to expose the "collective habits and customs" binding us to social patterns that perpetuate war. She studies cultural patterns by contrasting patriarchal and matriarchal configurations centered on Giles and Lucy, respectively. Interestingly, in Patterns Of Culture, Benedict centers on a single individual within each of the cultures she studies as the Ideal Man embodying the central values of his social group. Woolf similarly identifies Giles as the patriarchal ideal, and her exposure of his violence and egotism is an attack on the society which aims at every level of public and private life to produce violent men like him.