The idea that sanity is a matter of perspective can be seen in Virginia Woolf's censoring of her true self because this will appear as insanity to others, even to herself; Cunningham's modern-day readership is able to understand Virginia's state of mind as other than 'insane': "She has learned over the years that sanity involves a certain measure of impersonation, not simply for the benefit of husband and servants but for the sake, first and foremost, of one's own convictions."—Virginia Woolf. p. 83, 1999 4th Estate paperback edition. Suicide is also a major theme in each story in the novel. Patterns of three Apart from the novel's three female protagonists, and the three symbiotic storylines that they appear in, there are other examples in the novel where Cunningham patterns his story on groups of three. Most conspicuous of all is the threeway relationship that once existed between Clarissa, Richard and Louis when they were three students on holiday together. In the 'Mrs Woolf' storyline there is another grouping of three (biographically factual) in Vanessa's three children, Quentin, Julian, and Angelica, who come with their mother to visit Virginia. Then there is the nuclear family of three we find in Laura Brown, her husband Dan, and their son Richie. Michael Cunningham has admitted to his preoccupation with the number three in a televised interview with Charlie Rose. Its occurrence is prominent in the structures and character relationships of two further novels by Cunningham, Specimen Days and A Home at the End of the World. Trivia On her way to Richard's apartment, Clarissa Vaughan thinks she sees Meryl Streep. Meryl Streep ended up playing Clarissa Vaughan in Stephen Daldry's movie adaptation of The Hours. In the book, Clarissa Vaughan considers it might also have been Vanessa Redgrave that she saw. (Redgrave plays the part of Clarissa Dalloway in the 1997 film version of Mrs Dalloway.) As Streep comments in The Hours DVD commentary, it was Redgrave's late daughter, Natasha Richardson, who first sent her a copy of the novel. Richardson apparently felt that Streep might enjoy reading about her fictional self in the novel. Mrs Brown is a character in Virginia Woolf's essay, "Mr Bennett and Mrs Brown". Two anachronisms are presented by Cunningham in his book. The first is on page 30 (1998 edition) where he writes of Virginia Woolf, "She rises from her bed and goes into the bathroom." Hogarth