Virginia Woolf

Virginia Woolf turned to her diary as to an intimate friend, to whom she could freely and spontaneously confide her thoughts on public events or the joys and trials of domestic life. Between 1st January 1915 and her death in 1941 she regularly recorded her thoughts with unfailing grace, courage, honesty and wit. The result is one of the greatest diaries in the English language.

Selected Diaries

ame 

dima

i want to be through the splash and swimming in calm water again. i want to be writing unobserved.

we have bitten off a large piece of life–but why not?

she writes fifteen pages a day–knows everyone. but could i ever know her? the aristocratic manner is something like an actress’s–no false shyness or modesty–makes me feel virgin, shy, and schoolgirlish. she is grandier; hard; handsome; manly…

good resolutions wither because forced. and modern science teaches us to respect pleasure, or that is my reading.

indeed it is fatal to have visitors, in the middle of a story. all that agony now has to begin again. no one ever suffered so acutely from atmosphere as i do; and my leaves drooped one by one; though heaven knows my root is firm enough. the odd thing is that neither of us wishes for visitors. of course they threaten us from all sides - no: leave me, leave me, is all i say: to work in my brain.

however, i can't help thinking that we grow in cordiality, instead of drifting out of sight. and why not stand on one's own legs,, and defy them,

visitors leave on in tatters; yet with a relish for words. phrases roll on my tongue -

Selected Diaries quotes

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