On the morning of her party, Clarissa Dalloway decides to leave the house and “buy the flowers herself” (1). The atmosphere in her house and beyond, in Westminster, London, reminds her of her youth at Bourton, where she sometimes felt “that something awful was about to happen” (1), despite the freshness of the air and the calm.

As she walks through the city, Clarissa’s memories move on to Peter Walsh, who “would be back from India one of these days” (1). Clarissa isn’t exactly sure when because Peter’s letters are too boring for her to read with much care. On the morning of the day that the novel is set, “it was the middle of June” (2) in 1923, and Clarissa “thank[s] Heaven” (3) the Great War is over.

As Clarissa enters St. James’s Park, she encounters “her old friend Hugh” (3), and he greets her “rather extravagantly, for they had known each other as children” (3). Hugh Whitbread and his wife, Evelyn, will be attending Clarissa’s party later that day, though Clarissa’s husband, Richard, “was nearly driven mad by [Hugh]” (4). She remembers that Peter Walsh also disliked Hugh, which triggers memories of the past, when Clarissa turned down Peter’s proposal of marriage: “Never should she forget all that!” (6).