Think About It 098: VIRGINIA WOOLF

 

Is it not possible — I often wonder — that things we have felt with great intensity have an existence independent of our minds; are in fact still in existence?  And if so, will it not be possible, in time, that some device will be invented by which we can tap them?  I see it — the past — as an avenue lying behind; a long ribbon of scenes, emotions.  There at the end of the avenue still, are the garden and the nursery.  Instead of remembering here a scene and there a sound, I shall fit a plug into the wall; and listen in to the past.  I shall turn up August 1890.  I feel that strong emotion must leave its trace; and it is only a question of discovering how we can get ourselves again attached to it, so that we shall be able to live our lives through from the start.

 

Letter to Quentin Bell [28 October 1930]

 

 

 

 

Use the link below to read about the life and work of British novelist and essayist VIRGINIA WOOLF:

 

 

https://v-woolf-society.com/

 

 

 

 

 

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The Write Advice 086: VIRGINIA WOOLF

The only advice… that one person can give another about reading is to take no advice, to follow your own instincts, to use your own reason, to come to your own conclusions… After all, what laws can be laid down about books?  The battle of Waterloo was certainly fought on a certain day; but is Hamlet a better play than Lear?  Nobody can say.  Each must decide that question for himself.  To admit authorities, however heavily furred and gowned, into our libraries and let them tell us how to read, what to read, what value to place upon what we read, is to destroy the spirit of freedom which is the breath of those sanctuaries.  Everywhere else we may be bound by laws and conventions — there we have none…
     Perhaps the quickest way to understand the elements of what a novelist is doing is not to read, but to write; to make your own experiment with the dangers and difficulties with words.

 

How Should One Read A Book? (1925)


 

 

 

Use the link below to read more about the life and work of British novelist and essayist VIRGINIA WOOLF:

 

 

https://v-woolf-society.com/

 

 

 

 

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