#voyageout2023 #virginiawoolf
#buchende
All these voices sounded gratefully in St. John's ears as he lay half-asleep, and yet vividly conscious of everything around him. Across his eyes passed a procession of objects, black and indistinct, the figures of people picking up their books, their cards, their balls of wool, their workbaskets, and passing him one after another on their way to bed.
The rain rushed down. The rain seemed now to extinguish the lightning and the thunder, and the hall became almost dark.
After a minute or two, when nothing was heard but the rattle of water upon the glass, there was a perceptible slackening of the sound, and then the atmosphere became lighter.
"It's over," said another voice.
There was undoubtedly much suffering, much struggling, but, on the whole, surely there was a balance of happiness โ surely order did prevail. Nor were the deaths of young people really the saddest things in life โ they were saved so much; they kept so much. The dead โ she called to mind those who had died early, accidentallyโ were beautiful; she often dreamt of the dead.
Feeling oddly detached from it all, Terence remembered how Helen had said that whenever anything happened to you this was how people behaved. Was she right, or was she wrong?
Terence was reading Milton aloud, because he said the words of Milton had substance and shape, so that it was not necessary to understand what he was saying; one could merely listen to his words; one could almost handle them.
Love was all very well, and those snug domestic houses, with the kitchen below and the nursery above, which were so secluded and self-contained, like little islands in the torrents of the world; but the real things were surely the things that happened, the causes, the wars, the ideals, which happened in the great world outside, and went on independently of these women, turning so quietly and beautifully towards the men.
Helen stated that she disliked the hypocrisy of the English middle class โ but โShe had dwelt so often upon Mr. Hewet's prospects, his profession, his birth, appearance, and temperament, that she had almost forgotten what he was really like.โ
#virginiawoolf #voyageout2023 XXII
But it chilled them [Rachel, Terence] to see themselves in the glass, for instead of being vast and indivisible they were really very small and separate, the size of die glass leaving a large space for the reflection of other things.
๐ค
And now, she said, be quiet and tell me about the world; tell me about everything that's ever happened โฆ
#voyageout2023 XXI
#virginiawoolf
The darkness poured down profusely, and left them with scarcely any feeling of life, except that they were standing there together in the darkness.
(Terence and Rachel)
Nemi ๐๐ถ