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Virginia Woolf Quotes - Page 13

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If people are highly successful in their profession they lose their senses. Sight goes. They have no time to look at pictures. Sound goes. They have no time to listen to music. Speech goes. They have no time for

If people are highly successful in their profession they lose their senses. Sight goes. They have no time to look at pictures. Sound goes. They have no time to listen to music. Speech goes. They have no time for conversation. They lose their sense of proportion.

Success, Sight, People

Virginia Woolf (2005). “Selected Works of Virginia Woolf”, p.835, Wordsworth Editions

I remember I would not stand still; I would not stop being perplexed by everything that spontaneously attracted me or caught my attention. I would never cease to look around me and observe myself in relation to nature: either crystal clear skies and sun-melting afternoons, or foggy winter days and weirdly tinted nights. I would never cease to dream and stand by the window, ready to let the diversity of life pass freely through my skin; courageous enough to believe I stood a chance in devouring each shade of sensation. Or perhaps, immensely foolish to plainly - believe at all.

Dream, Believe, Winter

The waves broke and spread their waters swiftly over the shore. One after another they massed themselves and fell; the spray tossed itself back with the energy of their fall. The waves were steeped deep-blue save for a pattern of diamond-pointed light on their backs which rippled as the backs of great horses ripple with muscles as they move. The waves fell; withdrew and fell again, like the thud of a great beast stamping.

Horse, Moving, Fall

Virginia Woolf (2016). “The Waves”, p.109, Virginia Woolf

Let us not take for granted that life exists more fully in what is commonly thought big than in what is commonly thought small.

Granted, Bigs

Virginia Woolf (2013). “The Common Reader”, p.122, Lulu Press, Inc

Style is a very simple matter; it is all rhythm. Once you get that, you can't use the wrong words.

Simple, Style, Use

Virginia Woolf (1975). “The letters of Virginia Woolf”

The real novelist, the perfectly simple human being, could go on, indefinitely imaging.

Real, Simple, Novelists

We all indulge in the strange, pleasant process called thinking, but when it comes to saying, even to someone opposite, what we think, then how little we are able to convey! The phantom is through the mind and out of the window before we can lay salt on

Thinking, Opposites, Indulge In

Virginia Woolf (2013). “Delphi Complete Works of Virginia Woolf (Illustrated)”, p.2279, Delphi Classics

Let us record the atoms as they fall upon the mind in the order in which they fall.

Fall, Order, Mind

Virginia Woolf (2013). “The Common Reader”, p.122, Lulu Press, Inc

I enjoy almost everything. Yet I have some restless searcher in me. Why is there not a discovery in life? Something one can lay hands on and say “This is it”? My depression is a harassed feeling. I’m looking: but that’s not it — that’s not it. What is it? And shall I die before I find it?

Discovery, Hands, Feelings

Virginia Woolf (2003). “A Writer's Diary”, p.97, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt

One cannot bring children into a world like this. One cannot perpetuate suffering, or increase the breed of these lustful animals, who have no lasting emotions, but only whims and vanities, eddying them now this way, now that.

Children, Animal, Vanity

Virginia Woolf (2007). “Selected Works of Virginia Woolf”, p.185, Wordsworth Editions

if newspapers were written by people whose sole object in writing was to tell the truth about politics and the truth about art we should not believe in war, and we should believe in art.

Art, War, Believe

Virginia Woolf (2007). “Selected Works of Virginia Woolf”, p.853, Wordsworth Editions

I worship you, but I loathe marriage. I hate its smugness, its safety, its compromise and the thought of you interfering with my work, hindering me; what would you answer?

Hate, Worship You, Safety

Virginia Woolf (2013). “Delphi Complete Works of Virginia Woolf (Illustrated)”, p.218, Delphi Classics

I spent an hour looking at pots and carpets in the museums the other day, until the desire to describe them became like the desire for the lusts of the flesh.

Museums, Lust, Desire

Virginia Woolf (1976). “The Letters of Virginia Woolf”

There is no stability in this world. Who is to say what meaning there is in anything? Who is to foretell the flight of a word? It is a balloon that sails over tree-tops. To speak of knowledge is futile. All is experiment and adventure. We are forever mixing ourselves with unknown quantities. What is to come? I know not. But, as I put down my glass I remember; I am engaged to be married. I am to dine with my friends tonight. I am Bernard.

Adventure, Glasses, Tree

Virginia Woolf (2007). “Selected Works of Virginia Woolf”, p.693, Wordsworth Editions

It is equally vain,” she thought, “for you to think you can protect me, or for me to think I can worship you. The light of truth beats upon us without shadow, and the light of truth is damnably unbecoming to us both.

Thinking, Light, Worship You

Virginia Woolf (2007). “Selected Works of Virginia Woolf”, p.498, Wordsworth Editions

It seems as if an age of genius must be succeeded by an age of endeavour; riot and extravagance by cleanliness and hard work.

Birthday, Hard Work, Age

Virginia Woolf, David Bradshaw (2009). “Selected Essays”, p.26, Oxford University Press

Romantic Love is only an Illusion. A story one makes up in One's Mind about Another Person.

Romantic Love, Love Is, Mind

The interest in life does not lie in what people do, nor even in their relations to each other, but largely in the power to communicate with a third party, antagonistic, enigmatic, yet perhaps persuadable, which one may call life in general.

Life, Lying, Party

1925 The Common Reader, 'On Not Knowing Greek'.

What I like, or one of the things I like, about motoring is the sense it gives one of lighting accidentally, like a voyager who touches another planet with the tip of his toe, upon scenes which would have gone on, have always gone on, will go on, unrecorded, save for this chance glimpse. Then it seems to me I am allowed to see the heart of the world uncovered for a moment.

Heart, Giving, Glimpse

Virginia Woolf (1980). “The Diary of Virginia Woolf: 1925-1930”, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt P

Nothing thicker than a knife's blade separates happiness from melancholy.

Sad, Knives, Orlando

Virginia Woolf, Michael H. Whitworth (2014). “Orlando: A Biography”, p.28, Oxford University Press, USA

At one and the same time, therefore, society is everything and society is nothing. Society is the most powerful concoction in the world and society has no existence whatsoever

Powerful, World, Most Powerful

Virginia Woolf (1995). “Orlando: A Biography”, p.95, Wordsworth Editions

Let us again pretend that life is a solid substance, shaped like a globe, which we turn about in our fingers. Let us pretend that we can make out a plain and logical story, so that when one matter is despatched—love for instance—we go on, in an orderly manner, to the next.

Stories, Substance, Goes On

Virginia Woolf (2013). “Delphi Complete Works of Virginia Woolf (Illustrated)”, p.1428, Delphi Classics

The Lighthouse was then a silvery, misty-looking tower with a yellow eye, that opened suddenly, and softly in the evening. Now— James looked at the Lighthouse. He could see the white-washed rocks; the tower, stark and straight; he could see that it was barred with black and white; he could see windows in it; he could even see washing spread on the rocks to dry. So that was the Lighthouse, was it? No, the other was also the Lighthouse. For nothing was simply one thing. The other Lighthouse was true too.

Eye, Black And White, Rocks

At last she shut the book sharply, lay back, and drew a deep breath, expressive of the wonder which always marks the transition from the imaginary world to the real world.

Real, Book, Transition

Virginia Woolf (2013). “Delphi Complete Works of Virginia Woolf (Illustrated)”, p.114, Delphi Classics

Young women... you are, in my opinion, disgracefully ignorant. You have never made a discovery of any sort of importance. You have never shaken an empire or led an army into battle. The plays by Shakespeare are not by you, and you have never introduced a barbarous race to the blessings of civilization. What is your excuse?

Women, Army, Blessing

Virginia Woolf, Morag Shiach (1998). “A Room of One's Own: And, Three Guineas”, p.146

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