Strewn with Wreckage

“Literature is strewn with the wreckage of those who have minded beyond reason the opinion of others.” ― Virginia Woolf, A Room of One's Own

Writing is a deeply personal occupation (or preoccupation) that represents an intense engagement with the topic being written about.

You can not write well if you are continually worrying about what others think. Although Woolf gives us this excellent quote she was known to go through periods of self doubt about what others were thinking of her works. The anxiety was most intense just after publication of a new work.

Her writing is genuine and while she worried about opinions after publication she discussed little during the actual writing process except with Leonard Woolf, her husband.

For myself I write what I want, when I want, and to hell with the consequences.

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The Perfect Gift for a Woolf Lover

Woolf delighted in the physical act of writing words on paper. From the age of 11, she was continually experimenting with different kinds of pens in hope of finding one that would provide the perfect sensation. So what better gift for a Woolf lover than a pen named for her. The pen is the Mont Blanc Limited Edition writers pen dedicated to Virginia Woolf. A tad expensive but I have to get one. Any gifts accepted, I can give you my address!!

Virginia Woolf - The Indescribable Thing

Woolf once said that her death would be the “one experience I shall never describe.”

Luckily for us she did of course describe her life. Her powers of observation were well honed and I constantly marvel at the way she crafts words in her descriptions.

In a way though she is speaking to us from beyond the grave, her words live on to inspire new generations.

Death is the last mystery and we all have to wait to see what it is all about - oblivion or a door beyond?

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Virginia Woolf on Illusions

“Growing up is losing some illusions, in order to acquire others.” ― Virginia Woolf

While we often think that we lose our illusions as we leave childhood, we inevitably replace them with other and often more pernicious illusions. Some physicists would argue that life itself and the reality we experience is just an illusion.

This thought is also echoed by many mystics.

Illusions however are not inherently good or bad but a staple component of human living. Woolf's ability to hold life's illusions to our gaze is valuable and I love the illusory quality of her writing.

DK

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Virginia Woolf on the Past

“I can only note that the past is beautiful because one never realises an emotion at the time. It expands later, and thus we don't have complete emotions about the present, only about the past.” ― Virginia Woolf

This is a very important thought. Retrospection adds the body to our experiences. Emotion is raw at the time we experience it so time must often pass before it is moderated and becomes a thing of beauty. Reflection is a key skill that excellent writers possess.

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An Electronic Treasure for Virginia Woolf Scholars and Common Readers

Amazon has an amazing offer in Kindle Store for an eBook titled: Virginia Woolf : Complete Works 8 novels, 3 'biographies', 46 short stories, 606 essays, 1 play, her diary and some letters (Annotated). This is available at the discounted and unbelievable price of $3.47 USD.

You can order below:

It includes the following works:

THE NOVELS

The Voyage Out (1915) Night and Day (1919) Jacob’s Room (1922) Mrs. Dalloway (1925) To the Lighthouse (1927) The Waves (1931) The Years (1937) Between the Acts (1941)

THE ‘BIOGRAPHIES’

Orlando: a biography (1928) Flush: a biography (1933) Roger Fry: a biography (1940)

THE STORIES

Monday or Tuesday (1921) A Haunted House, and other short stories (1944) Mrs Dalloway’s Party (1973) The Complete Shorter Fiction (1985)

THE ESSAYS

The Common Reader I (1925) A Room of One’s Own (1929) On Being Ill (1930) The London Scene (1931) The Common Reader II (1932) Three Guineas (1938) The Death of the Moth, and other essays (1942) The Moment, and other essays (1947) The Captain’s Death Bed, and other essays (1950) Granite and Rainbow (1958) Books and Portraits (1978) Women And Writing (1979) 383 Essays from newspapers and magazines (see update v.3.0)

AUTOBIOGRAPHICAL WRITING

A Writer’s Diary (1953) Moments of Being (1976) The Diary Vols. 1–5 (1977-84) (see updates v.4.0, v.5.0, and v.6.0) The Letters Vols. 3,4+5 (1977-79) (see update v.7.0 and v.8.0) The Letters of V.W. and Lytton Strachey (1956) (see update v.8.0)

THE PLAY

Freshwater: A Comedy (both versions) (1976)

This resource makes it so easy to access Woolf's writings and as an eBook you can have it with you all of the time.

Happy Reading

Grant

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Katherine Mansfield and Virginia Woolf: A Public of Two

Angela Smith has an interesting entry on the Oxford Scholarship Online web site (http://www.oxfordscholarship.com/view/10.1093/acprof:oso/9780198183983.001.0001/acprof-9780198183983. the abstract is shown below:

Abstract Long after the death of Katherine Mansfield (1888–1923), Virginia Woolf (1882–1941) described being haunted by her in dreams. Through detailed comparative readings of their fiction, letters, and diaries, this book explores the intense affinity between the two writers. Their particular inflection of modernism is interpreted through their shared experience as ‘threshold people’, familiar with the liminal, for each of them a zone of transition and habitation. Writing at a time when the First World War and changing attitudes to empire problematized boundaries and definitions of foreignness, this book shows how the fiction of both Mansfield and Woolf is characterised by moments of disorienting suspension in which the perceiving consciousness sees the familiar made strange, and the domestic made menacing.

As a New Zealander I have a keen interest in the writings of both Katherine Mansfield (another New Zealander)and Virginia Woolf. Woolf concurred that the only writer whose writing she would like to be able to emulate was that of Katherine Mansfield. Both women were pushing the edges of Victorian and post Victorian society in the late 1800s and early 1900s. I had not seen the mention to her being haunted by KM in her dreams before.