This study attempts to answer a question at the core of Modernist thought: what is the self? Specifically, this study examines state apparatuses within two novels by Virginia Woolf: Mrs. Dalloway and The Waves. This analysis discusses how state apparatuses destabilize and call into question the existence of identity in the novels. Identity refers to “the sameness of a person or thing at all times or in all circumstances; the condition of being a single individual; the fact that a person or thing is itself and not something else; individuality; personality” (“Identity, n2”). Forced societal expectations via state apparatuses prompt characters to conform to standardized and repressive modes of behavior. The characters’ expected societal roles differ from their interior, unfulfilled desires. This dissonance, between expected behavior and desired behavior, creates problems within characters throughout these novels. Furthermore, characters in these novels constantly view themselves through the repressive gaze of prevailing ideologies and thereby experience mental strife. Essentially, I argue that anxiety signifies state apparatuses undermining the idea of a stable identity. If fear makes up part of the self, then what is the self exactly? Keywords: Absence, Althusser, Identity, State Apparatus, Woolf