15/11/11 08:21:31.02 lZbcX0VL.net
Virginia Woolf "To the Lighthouse," 1-3
[Note by the quoter: The following quotation depicts the feelings and
thoughts of Mrs. Ramsay, a middle-aged mother of eight children. She
is staying for a summer vacation in a country cottage on the Isle of
Skye (one of the Habrides, Scotland) rented by the family together
with her children, her husband, and her several guests. She is sitting
in the house, with her young son. She is hearing murmurs from another
room. The murmurs are probably those of her husband and one of her
guests. She also hears the voices of some of her children playing
cricket outdoors. She also hears the soothing sound of the waves.
The following quote consists of one very long sentence. Or could it
be called three sentences? (It looks like a single sentence divided into
three segments by semicolons.) Even if they are three sentences, they
are each very long anyway. Structurally, they are hard for me to
understand. For me at least, to savor the delicate meaning of the
passage, it takes a long, long time. But the effort is quite rewarding.
It is just beautiful. Virginia Woolf is a genius of quietude.]
******** QUOTE ********
But here, as she [= Mrs. Ramsay] turned the page, suddenly her
search for the picture of a rake or a mowing-machine was interrupted.
The gruff murmur, irregularly broken by the taking out of pipes and
the putting in of pipes which had kept on assuring her, though she
could not hear what was said (as she sat in the window), that the men
were happily talking;
(The long sentence is continued on the next post.)