Clarissa Dalloway's character was introduced to us in fragments; but the pieces were large and began to fit together rather easily. Our introduction to Richard, on the other hand, has existed only in very small fragments so far — as an instant in memory (Clarissa's) or in contrast to another character (Peter Walsh). In this scene, the fragments fasten themselves to a large, chapter length portrait, and we finally meet the man Clarissa preferred to Peter Walsh.
Certainly Virginia Woolf has nursed our curiosity about Richard Dalloway. Peter Walsh has told us a few things about him, as has Lady Bruton, but sometimes one person's comments about another will reveal infinitely more about himself than about the other person. Peter's judgment, for example, that Richard would be far happier in Norfolk than in London, should be held in suspension until we hear or have verification from Richard himself; it's possible that Peter could have been rationalizing. As it turns out Peter's intuition was accurate; Richard is nostalgic for Norfolk. He is not merely the vague English official that has been suggested by various hints. He is sensitive to the feel of the wind, the color of the sky, and the movements of grass. He is like Clarissa in this respect. But, unlike Clarissa, he is not resistant. Clarissa resists too-active sensual experiences and active male-female relationships, where Richard is more pliable, both with Clarissa and with a stuffed shirt like Hugh Whitbread. Richard's pliability is seen in the manner in which he acquiesces to Clarissa's needs and notions about the temper of their marriage, and because he is naturally amiable, he gives in to Hugh's whims.
Here Virginia Woolf shows us a situation in which Richard is aware that Hugh is a prig and poseur yet follows him into the jewelry store anyway. Therefore we realize that Richard lets Hugh make demands of him, just as he lets Clarissa make demands of him. In other words, Richard lets himself be carried along. And thus by characterizing Richard in this way, Virginia Woolf moves imperceptibly from character to motif. She speaks again of tides and seas and we realize that wave-like, scene by scene, we — and the characters of this drama — are being carried along toward the shore, where the party will climax the novel. Then all will recede — back into the past, back into the sea, back into memory. Throughout this novel, Virginia Woolf has taken us on toward the party, inserting the sound of clocks as they marked off the end of one wave, one moment of this day, then merged us into the next moment to carry us farther.
