The opera takes place in a single day. Clarissa is in New York City in 1999. Virginia is in Richmond, England, in 1923. Laura is in Los Angeles in 1949.

本歌劇講述的故事發生在一天之內。克拉麗莎身處1999年的紐約。維吉尼亞生活在1923年的英國里士滿。蘿拉則處身於1949年的洛杉磯。


Act I
The chorus, representing Virginia’s inner thoughts, tinkers with the opening line of the novel she’s working on, Mrs. Dalloway.

Clarissa and her partner Sally are preparing their West Village apartment for tonight’s party celebrating Clarissa’s best friend, Richard, a writer who is dying of AIDS. Sally doubts Richard will be well enough to attend, but Clarissa refuses to accept the dire state of Richard’s health.

Clarissa, staving off anxiety about Richard, sets out to buy flowers for the party. She delights in the wonders of Washington Square and is intrigued by the otherworldly singing of the Man Under the Arch. She runs into Walter, a writer who shares Sally’s doubts about whether Richard will be well enough for his party. 

Virginia Woolf has just woken up and entered her studio, anxious about beginning her new novel. As she watches her husband, Leonard edit proofs, she reflects on the many roles he plays in her life.

Clarissa enters the flower shop, and Barbara the florist greets her with a kiss. Clarissa escapes into a momentary fantasy in which Barbara is her lover and they never have to leave the shop. She finds the perfect flowers and heads off to check on Richard.

In her studio, Virginia finds it hard to start work on her novel. She is distracted by thoughts of London and its bustle, contrasting these visions with the lifeless suburbs of Richmond. Despite her fears about succumbing to depression, she starts to write, and it flows.

In her bed in Los Angeles, Laura Brown is reading the sentences from Mrs. Dalloway that Virginia is writing. Laura dreads facing her wifely and motherly duties, since today is her husband Dan’s birthday and her young son Richie is waiting for her downstairs. She staves off her anxiety by turning back to Mrs. Dalloway.

Laura enters her kitchen to find her energetic husband Dan and six-year-old Richie concerned about her. She tries to convince them she is fine, but internally agonizes about her fears and insecurities. Dan, unaware of the severity of her struggles, goes off to work.

Clarissa is irritated by Sally’s doubts about Richard’s health and wonders whether Sally is the best match for her. Virginia realizes that a character in her novel must die but she isn’t sure who. Laura struggles with the task of baking a birthday cake with Richie while managing her anxiety.

On her way to Richard’s, Clarissa stops at the corner where, years ago, she ended their nascent romantic relationship, breaking it off using a cruel phrase she now regrets. She reflects on how one sentence can change the course of a life.
Clarissa arrives at Richard’s apartment to make sure that he remembers the party. Richard, frail and forgetful, tells her he can’t face the party, but she snaps at him, telling him he needs to try harder. He confides in her that sometimes he still imagines them as lovers.

In Laura’s kitchen, her anxiety escalates as she tries to bake the cake with Richie. Virginia asks her cook, Nelly, whether she believes that a young woman could start off the day joyfully and then decide to kill herself. This leads Virginia into a suicidal fantasy foreshadowing the way she’ll eventually end her own life.

Laura’s neighbor Kitty visits and tells Laura that she might have cancer. Laura escapes into a romantic fantasy about Kitty. Snapping out of it, she finds herself kissing Kitty as she consoles her. Virginia, too anxious to write, decides to head out into the world.

Clarissa returns home to find Sally busily preparing for the party, focused on practical concerns about seating. Clarissa has a gnawing feeling that something’s terribly wrong with Richard and heads back toward his apartment. Virginia, seized with a need to escape, is unsure whether she should take the train to London or end her life in the river. Laura feels a desperate need to run away from her suffocating homelife and drops off Richie with the sitter, driving toward Pasadena, not knowing where she’ll end up. The three women are united in their need to escape and in their terror of what they might find.

第一幕
合唱歌詞重複著維吉尼亞正在創作的小說《達洛維夫人》開篇的幾句話，這是她內心的真實寫照。

克拉麗莎和她的伴侶薩莉正在裝飾她們位於西村的公寓，今晚，她們要為克拉麗莎最好的朋友理查舉辦一個慶祝派對。理查是一個作家，他患有愛滋病，就要不久於人世了。薩莉對理查能否出席深表懷疑，但克拉麗莎卻拒絕接受理查健康狀況堪憂的事實。克拉麗莎暫且放下對理查的擔心，出門去買派對上要用的花。華盛頓廣場的景致讓她心情愉悅，有人在唱《拱門下的男人》，脫俗的歌聲讓她聽入迷了。她還遇到了作家瓦爾特，他與薩莉一樣懷疑理查的身體狀況還能否出席派對。

維吉尼亞.伍爾夫剛剛醒來便進了書房，急切地想開始創作自己的新小說。看著自己的丈夫倫納德校稿時，她回憶起了他在自己生命中所扮演過的種種角色。

克拉麗莎來到了花店，花藝師芭芭拉用親吻的方式和她打了招呼。那一瞬間，克拉麗莎陷入了幻想，她想像芭芭拉是自己的愛人，兩人可以永遠生活在花店裡。隨後她挑選了最合適的花，又前往理查處看望。

書房裡，維吉尼亞發現自己很難開始創作，因為記憶裡倫敦的熱鬧場面讓她分神，這些場面與里士滿死氣沉沉的郊區形成了鮮明對比。儘管擔心自己陷入抑鬱，但她還是開始動筆了，文字宛如行雲流水。

蘿拉.布朗躺在洛杉磯家中的床上，讀著維吉尼亞的作品《達洛維夫人》。對於自己作為妻子和母親的責任，蘿拉感到抗拒。今天是她的丈夫丹的生日，年幼的兒子里奇正在樓下等她。她將注意力拉回到《達洛維夫人》上，將焦慮暫時拋之腦後。

蘿拉來到廚房，發現精力充沛的丈夫丹和六歲的里奇都在為她擔心。蘿拉試圖讓他們相信自己沒事，但內心的恐懼和不安讓她深感苦惱。丹並沒覺察出她的掙扎和痛苦，他出發去工作了。薩莉懷疑理查的健康狀況，這讓克拉麗莎很生氣，她開始思索薩莉究竟是不是自己的最佳伴侶。維吉尼亞感覺自己的小說裡應該有一個角色要死去，但她不確定是哪個。蘿拉一邊和里奇一起烤著生日蛋糕，一邊與內心的焦慮糾纏。

在去往理查家的路上，克拉麗莎在一個街角停了下來。幾年前，就是在這裡，她結束了自己與理查剛建立不久的戀人關係，當時她口不擇言，現在想起來隻覺得懊悔。她反思著一個人的人生軌跡是如何因為一句話而改變的。

克拉麗莎來到了理查的公寓，讓他別忘了派對的事。理查已經十分虛弱和健忘，他告訴克拉麗莎，自己無法出席派對，卻遭到克拉麗莎的厲聲指責，要他盡力一試。理查向克拉麗莎吐露心聲，說自己有時還是會想像他們仍是戀人。

廚房裡，蘿拉和里奇一起烤著蛋糕，她心中的不安變得越發嚴重。維吉尼亞問家中的廚師奈莉是否相信一位年輕女性一大早還心情愉悅，但之後會決定自殺。維吉尼亞因此陷入了自殺幻想，這也預示著最終她會以這樣的方式結束自己的生命。

蘿拉的鄰居凱蒂到訪，她告訴蘿拉自己可能得了癌症。蘿拉開始對凱蒂產生了曖昧的幻想。當她從幻想中回過神來的時候，她發現自己正一邊親吻著凱蒂，又一邊安慰她。維吉尼亞急於創作，她決定投身世俗世界。

克拉麗莎回到家，發現薩莉正忙著準備派對，思考著如何落座這樣的實際問題。克拉麗莎感覺很不安，她覺得理查很不對勁，於是她又返回了理查的公寓。維吉尼亞想逃離現在的生活，但她不確定是應該登上去倫敦的火車，還是跳入河裡結束自己的生命。蘿拉迫切地想擺脫這種另她窒息的家庭生活，於是她把里奇交給保姆照看，駕車向帕薩迪納的方向駛去，她自己也不清楚終點會在哪裡。同樣渴望逃離，同樣對自己可能得到的發現感到恐懼，這三位女性因此被聯繫到了一起。


INTERMISSION
中場休息


Act II
Laura has found herself on a bed in an otherworldly hotel room, armed with a bottle of pills and Mrs. Dalloway. She doesn’t know why she’s there or what she’ll do now: kill herself or read her book. She tries to piece together the last hour, remembering a surreal interaction with the Hotel Clerk.

Laura reads Mrs. Dalloway, conjuring up Virginia, who is seen approaching the river—perhaps to commit kill herself? Laura also contemplates suicide. Virginia is momentarily distracted by the voice of the Man Under the Arch. Leonard arrives and tells Virginia he was convinced that this time he’d find her dead, and he’d have to tell her sister Vanessa that he had failed. Virginia is moved by the depth of his concern.

Clarissa is heading back to Richard’s when she overhears a church choir rehearsing. Their lyrics seem written for her. Outside Richard’s apartment, she finds Louis, Richard’s ex-boyfriend, who is debating whether or not to visit him. He recalls the formative summer that the three of them spent in Wellfleet, triggering a flashback depicting the delirious closeness Clarissa and Richard once shared, a closeness that excluded Louis.

Virginia, back in her studio, hears children’s voices and wonders if she’s losing her mind. She goes out to her garden to find her sister Vanessa and her three children holding a funeral service for a dying bird. As Virginia manically makes a grave for the bird, Vanessa realizes the severity of her sister’s illness. In the hotel room, Laura castigates herself for considering suicide when she has a young child and another one on the way. She is determined to stay alive and to face her motherly duties.

Clarissa enters Richard’s apartment to find him standing on his window ledge. She is terrified, but he seems to finally be at peace. As she tries to convince him to step down, he explains that all he wanted was to write something good, something that might touch someone. He tells Clarissa he loves her and steps out the window, falling to his death on the street below.

As Clarissa races over to Richard’s broken body, the chorus becomes her short-circuiting psyche, reassembling images and words from the day. Laura brings herself to leave the hotel and drives down the Pasadena Freeway. Virginia, at the bird grave, realizes her sanity is slipping. All three women seem to be drowning.

Laura picks up Richie at the home of the sitter, Mrs. Latch. Richie tells his mother he was scared that she was gone because she had something “growing inside her,” which is what he heard Kitty say. At the Woolf’s dining table, Virginia thanks Leonard for the happiness he has given her. Dan comes home to his birthday celebration and expresses how happy his family has made him. Richard’s friends gather at his party, now a wake. Sally tries to convince Clarissa she did everything she could for him. Clarissa realizes that her failure to acknowledge Richard’s dire physical and mental state might have contributed to his death. Richard’s mother Laura arrives at the party and tries to express regret about her failures as a mother.

As the others recede, Clarissa, Laura, and Virginia find themselves in a space that transcends time and place, where they can finally perceive each other. They are astonished that all along, as they traveled through their days feeling alone, there were others who felt the same way, influencing and being influenced by others in ways that they couldn’t possibly understand.

第二幕 
蘿拉醒來發現自己正躺在酒店的床上，手邊是一瓶藥丸和一本《達洛維夫人》。她不知道自己為什麼會出現在那裡，也不知道接下來要怎麼做，是服藥自盡還是讀書。她試圖將最後一小時的記憶拼湊起來，於是她想起自己在朦朧中與一個酒店服務員接觸過。
蘿拉讀著《達洛維夫人》，維吉尼亞出現了。她正向河邊靠近——也許是想自殺？蘿拉也有過自殺的念頭。維吉尼亞的注意力被《拱門下的男人》的聲音吸引了。倫納德過來告訴維吉尼亞，他相信這次他會發現維吉尼亞已死去，他要告訴她的姐姐凡妮莎自己失敗了。維吉尼亞被他的深切關心打動了。

在返回理查家的路上，克拉麗莎無意中聽到了教堂唱詩班在彩排，那歌詞仿佛就是專門為她寫的。在公寓的門外，她遇到了理查的前男友路易士，他正考慮要不要和理查見面。他回憶起了他們三人年輕時一起在韋爾福利特度過的那個夏天，那時克拉麗莎與理查正如膠似漆，這段親密關係裡是沒有路易士的。

維吉尼亞回到書房，聽到孩子們的聲音，便自問是不是失去了理智。她走出門外，來到花園裡，發現姐姐凡妮莎和她的三個孩子正在給一隻快要死去鳥舉行葬禮。維吉尼亞急切地想給小鳥弄出一個墳墓來，凡妮莎這才意識到妹妹病得很嚴重。酒店客房內，蘿拉為自己曾有過自殺的念頭而自責，因為她的一個孩子還小，而另一個尚未出生。她決定活下去，直面自己作為一個母親的職責。
克拉麗莎走進理查的公寓，發現他正站在窗臺上。克拉麗莎大驚失色，但理查最終好像還是平靜了下來。克拉麗莎試圖說服他從窗臺上下來，他解釋說，自己唯一想做的就是寫出一些優秀的、觸動人心的作品。他告訴克拉麗莎自己愛她，然後便縱身一躍，摔死在樓下的街道上。

克拉麗莎奔向理查破碎的身軀，合唱映射出她內心的愕然，這天的發生過的事、說過的話都拼湊到了一起。蘿拉離開酒店，駕車沿帕薩迪納高速行駛。在小鳥的墓旁，維吉尼亞意識到自己剛才失神了。三位女性仿佛都經歷了溺水。

蘿拉把里奇從保姆拉奇太太家接出來。里奇說他很害怕媽媽會離開，因為他聽到凱蒂說「她身體裡長了東西」。在伍爾夫家的餐桌前，維吉尼亞感謝倫納德給予她的快樂。丹回到家，家人為他慶祝生日，他說家庭讓自己感到幸福。理查的朋友本來是參加他的聚會的，現在成了為他守夜。薩莉試圖告訴克拉麗莎，她已經做了她能為理查做的一切。克拉麗莎意識到，自己對理查的糟糕的身體和精神狀態沒有正確的認知，這很可能是造成他死亡的原因之一。理查的母親蘿拉也來到了派對上，她說作為一個失敗的母親，她感到痛心。

其他人離開後，克拉麗莎、蘿拉和維吉尼亞發現自己身處在一個互相交叉穿越的時空裡，她們能夠看到彼此。這讓她們大受震撼，她們原本都孤獨地活著，但其實一直以來都還有其他人與自己心靈相通，通過一種她們可能無法理解的方式相互影響著。