《达洛维夫人》与《追爱》代表了20世纪英国女性小说家对英国文学传统中聚会主题的继承与反叛。它们表明,随着英国社会生活和阶级结构在两次世界大战之间的变动与重组,聚会不再扎根和局限于稳固的上层阶级,而是包容和混杂了不同的阶级话语。这使聚会中的女性处在一种极为尴尬的状况,既受到本阶层内部性别等级的压制与压迫,又面对着来自不同阶层的“挑唆”与挑战。与此同时,私人空间与公共空间之间的分离也愈加明显。这主要是指,女性寄寓于家庭聚会中的情感诉求和浪漫情调与由男权话语主导的社会生活中的麻木状态和功利主义之间的冲突日渐激化。于是,聚会活动对于女性来说便具有了双重意义:同时成为抗争和退缩的场地。 “Lady Dalloway” and “Chasing Love” represent the 20th century British female novelists to inherit and rebel against the theme of the party in the tradition of British literature. They show that with the change and reorganization of British social life and class structure between the two world wars, the gathering no longer takes root and is limited to a stable upper class but contains and miscellaneous different class discourses. This puts the women in the party in a state of extreme embarrassment that is not only suppressed and oppressed by the gender hierarchy within their own classes but also faced with “incitement” and challenges from all walks of life. At the same time, the separation between private and public spaces has become more pronounced. This mainly refers to the intensification of conflicts between the emotional appeal and romantic sentiment of women in family reunions and the numbness and utilitarianism in the social life dominated by patriarchal discourse. As a result, party activities have a dual meaning for women: at the same time as a venue for protest and withdrawal.