What is a woman? I assure you, I do not know ... I do not believe that anybody can know until she has expressed herself in all the arts and professions open to human skill.
Virginia WoolfFinally, I would thank, had I not lost his name and address, a gentleman in America, who has generously and gratuitously corrected the punctuation, the botany, the entomology, the geography, and the chronology of previous works of mine and will, I hope, not spare his services on the present occasion.
Virginia WoolfWell, Iโve had my fun; Iโve had it, he thought, looking up at the swinging baskets of pale geraniums. And it was smashed to atomsโhis fun, for it was half made up, as he knew very well; invented, this escapade with the girl; made up, as one makes up the better part of life, he thoughtโmaking onself up; making her up; creating an exquisite amusement, and something more. But odd it was, and quite true; all this one could never shareโit smashed to atoms.
Virginia WoolfIt is strange how a scrap of poetry works in the mind and makes the legs move in time to it along the road.
Virginia WoolfThe grey nurse resumed her knitting as Peter Walsh, on the hot seat beside her, began snoring. In her grey dress, moving her hands indefatigably yet quietly, she seemed like the champion of the rights of sleepers, like one of those spectral presences which rise in twilight in woods made of sky and branches. The solitary traveler, haunter of lanes, disturber of ferns, and devastator of hemlock plants, looking up, suddenly sees the giant figure at the end of the ride.
Virginia Woolf