When Virginia Woolf wrote The Waves in 1931, all and sundry changed in the already known about writing novels.
She blurred not only the lines between prose and poetry, but also between what was thought of as separate individuality and a collectively woven, continual stream of consciousness.
With her cryptic and ambiguous soliloquies, dialogues spanning the lives of six (and, at times, seven) characters, and nine meticulously crafted interludes portraying a coastal scene in varying parts of the day, Woolf had created what she referred to as a “playpoem”.
What follows is the opening of that “playpoem” and the first dawn of her interludes.
"The sun had not yet risen. The sea was indistinguishable from the sky, except that the sea was slightly creased as if a cloth had wrinkles in it. Gradually as the sky whitened a dark line lay on the horizon dividing the sea from the sky and the grey cloth became barred with thick strokes moving, one after another, beneath the surface, following each other, pursuing each other, perpetually.
As they neared the shore each bar rose, heaped itself, broke and swept a thin veil of white water across the sand. The wave paused, and then drew out again, sighing like a sleeper whose breath comes and goes unconsciously. Gradually the dark bar on the horizon became clear as if the sediment in an old wine-bottle has sunk and left the glass green. Behind it, too, the sky cleared as if the white sediment there had sunk, or as if the arm of a woman couched beneath the horizon had raised a lamp and flat bars of white, green and yellow spread across the sky like the blades of a fan. Then she raised her lamp higher and the air seemed to become fibrous and to tear away from the green surface flickering and flaming in red and yellow fibres like the smoky fire that roars from a bonfire. Gradually the fibres of the burning bonfire were fused into one haze, one incandescence which lifted the weight of the woollen grey sky on top of it and turned it to a million atoms of soft blue. The surface of the sea slowly became transparent and lay rippling and sparkling until the dark stripes were almost rubbed out. Slowly the arm that held the lamp raised it higher and then higher until a broad flame became visible; an arc of fire burnt on the rim of the horizon, and all round it the sea blazed gold.
The light struck upon the trees in the garden, making one leaf transparent and then another. One bird chirped high up; there was a pause; another chirped lower down. The sun sharpened the walls of the house, and rested like the tip of a fan upon a white blind and made a blue finger-print of shadow under the leaf by the bedroom window. The blind stirred slightly, but all within was dim and unsubstantial. The birds sang their blank melody outside."
About Virginia Woolf
Early Life and Family
Born into a Victorian family on January 25, 1882, in London, England, Virginia Woolf is one of the greatest literary figures in English literature. Woolf’s father, Leslie Stephen, was an eminent literary figure and the first editor (1882–91) of the Dictionary of National Biography. Her mother, Julia Jackson, possessed great beauty and a reputation for saintly self-sacrifice.
Woolf’s early life was rooted in the ideals of the Victorian era, and profoundly moulded by the dynamics of the Stephen family.
Experiencing Loss and Inner Transformation
Wool was met with the meaning of tragedy at an early age. In 1895, when she was just 13, her mother died and a cease-writing took place in her life. Soon after, in 1897, Wool’s half-sister, Stella Duckworth also died. When she finally lost her father, in 1904, Woolf’s understanding of mortality and the fragility of human connections took on a new meaning. In the tremendous bounds of pain, she found solace and comfort through writing, which, to her, was a tool to overcome grief and articulate her evolving thoughts and emotions.
Exploring Art, Literature and the Bloomsbury Group
Following her father’s death and a nervous breakdown, Woolf found herself at the center of the Bloomsbury group, a gathering of radical young minds including Lytton Strachey, Clive Bell, and John Maynard Keynes. It was a crucial period for Wool’s evolution, as she was able to explore her artistic inclinations, engaged in discussions on art, literature, and societal norms. The group’s dynamics, combined with her family's move to the bohemian Bloomsbury section of London, gave Woolf and her siblings the freedom to pursue their studies, personal interests, and artistic endeavors, independently of societal expectations.
Woolf’s Creative Evolution
Woolf's creative journey took a significant turn in 1908 when she devoted herself to "re-forming" the novel. She wanted to create a holistic form that embraced aspects of life which were previously seen as "fugitive" from the Victorian novel. A period noted with great experimentation, it led to Woolf creating her first novel, The Voyage Out. The novel's characters, all inspired by real-life prototypes, laid the foundation for Woolf's innovative approach to character development, foreshadowing her later experiments with narrative form.
Mental Health Issues and Literary Growth
Woolf faced precarious mental health between 1910 and 1915, but did not stop her literary pursuits. When she completed The Voyage Out in 1913, she found proof of her resilience in overcoming personal struggles. Woolf's later works, including Night and Day (1919) and Jacob's Room (1922), demonstrated her mastery of traditional novelistic forms before moving into more experimental territories. The publication of Mrs. Dalloway (1925) and To the Lighthouse (1927) solidified Woolf's reputation as a major literary figure, with her innovative narrative techniques leaving an indelible mark on the Modernist literary landscape.
Woolf’s Legacy and Lasting Impact
Virginia Woolf's legacy goes well beyond her novels. Her essays on the art of writing, reading, and societal issues remain extremely influential. Woolf's exploration of point of view, fluid narratives, and her ability to capture the complexities of human experience without explicit details set her apart as a Modernist trailblazer. Her literary experimentation anticipated postmodern sensibilities, emphasizing the evanescence of boundaries and categories. As Woolf faced personal challenges and the looming threat of World War II, her commitment to writing became a powerful means of grappling with despair and engaging with the pressing issues of her time.
She died on March 28th, 1941, by drowning herself near her house in Sussex, England.
Virginia Woolf's Essential Books on Sale Now
"One of Woolf's most experimental novels, The Waves presents six characters in monologue - from morning until night, from childhood into old age - against a background of the sea. The result is a glorious chorus of voices that exists not to remark on the passing of events but to celebrate the connection between its various individual parts."
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"A classic for a reason. My mind was warped into a new shape by her prose and it will never be the same again." -- Greta Gerwig
"The authorized, original edition of one of the great literary masterpieces of the twentieth century: a miraculous novel of family, love, war, and mortality, with a foreword from Eudora Welty. From the seemingly trivial postponement of a visit to a nearby lighthouse, Woolf constructs a remarkable, moving examination of the complex tensions and allegiances of family life and conflict between men and women. To the Lighthouse is made up of three powerfully charged visions into the life of the Ramsay family living in a summer house off the rocky coast of Scotland. There's the serene and maternal Mrs. Ramsay, the tragic yet absurd Mr. Ramsay, their eight children, and assorted holiday guests. With the lighthouse excursion postponed, Woolf shows the small joys and quiet tragedies of everyday life that seemingly could go on forever. But as time winds its way through their lives, the Ramsays face, alone and together, the greatest of human challenges and its greatest triumph--the human capacity for change. A moving portrait in miniature of family life, To the Lighthouse also has profoundly universal implications, giving language to the silent space that separates people and the space that they transgress to reach each other."
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"A stunning new edition of Virginia Woolf's engulfing portrait of one day in a woman's life, featuring a new foreword by Jenny Offill, the New York Times bestselling author of Weather and Dept. of Speculation
A Penguin Classics Deluxe Edition
"Mrs. Dalloway said she would buy the flowers herself." It's one of the most famous opening lines in literature, that of Virginia Woolf's beloved masterpiece of time, memory, and the city. In the wake of World War I and the 1918 flu pandemic, Clarissa Dalloway, elegant and vivacious, is preparing for a party and remembering those she once loved. In another part of London, Septimus Smith is suffering from shell-shock and on the brink of madness. Their days interweave and their lives converge as the party reaches its glittering climax. In a novel in which she perfects the interior monologue and recapitulates the life cycle in the hours of the day, from first light to the dark of night, Woolf achieves an uncanny simulacrum of consciousness, bringing past, present, and future together, and recording, impression by impression, minute by minute, the feel of life itself. This edition is collated from all known proofs, manuscripts, and impressions to reflect the author's intentions, and includes a catalog of emendations, an illuminating introduction and endnotes by the distinguished feminist critic Elaine Showalter, and a map of Mrs. Dalloway's London. For more than seventy-five years, Penguin has been the leading publisher of classic literature in the English-speaking world. With more than 2,000 titles, Penguin Classics represents a global bookshelf of the best works throughout history and across genres and disciplines. Readers trust the series to provide authoritative texts enhanced by introductions and notes by distinguished scholars and contemporary authors, as well as up-to-date translations by award-winning translators.
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