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Woolf, Virginia, 1882-1941

"The Voyage Out"


Bax, now by Evelyn, now by the imposition of ponderous stupidity, the
weight of the entire world. Thus tormented, she would twist her hands
together, for all things were wrong, all people stupid. Vaguely seeing
that there were people down in the garden beneath she represented them
as aimless masses of matter, floating hither and thither, without aim
except to impede her. What were they doing, those other people in the
world?
"Nobody knows," she said. The force of her rage was beginning to spend
itself, and the vision of the world which had been so vivid became dim.
"It's a dream," she murmured. She considered the rusty inkstand,
the pen, the ash-tray, and the old French newspaper. These small and
worthless objects seemed to her to represent human lives.
"We're asleep and dreaming," she repeated. But the possibility which now
suggested itself that one of the shapes might be the shape of Terence
roused her from her melancholy lethargy. She became as restless as she
had been before she sat down. She was no longer able to see the world
as a town laid out beneath her. It was covered instead by a haze of
feverish red mist. She had returned to the state in which she had been
all day. Thinking was no escape. Physical movement was the only refuge,
in and out of rooms, in and out of people's minds, seeking she knew not
what. Therefore she rose, pushed back the table, and went downstairs.


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