To look life in the face…and know it.
Disclaimer: Well, quite obviously I don't own Virginia Woolf, her work, The Hours by Michael Cunningham, or the movie.
Authors Note: A little tribute to Virginia Woolf – who is my current fascination. She died 28 March 1941 near Lewes in England, when she left her Sussex home, filled her pockets with stones and committed suicide by throwing herself into the River Ouse. An inner monologue of that great opening scene in 'The Hours'.
"Every secret of a writer's soul, every experience of his life, every quality of his mind is written large in his works."
Virginia wondered what Vanessa thought in the moments after The Kiss. She had returned it sweetly, as a sister would, though with a hint of worry in her eyes, as though she had brushed the coat tails of Virginia's deep and immense unhappiness, of her secret, passionate longings – that weren't for her husband, dear Leonard, who was so very good.
So very good at being undemanding, at keeping her safe – so very good. Virginia was sorry, so very sorry, he was burdened with her – sorry that he never got what was due from a wife to her husband, at least not in these later years, when it was all Virginia could do to fight off the headaches, to make sure the walls of her small room didn't swim before her eyes, resplendent in fire and carnival colours that had no place in the suburbs. She didn't want to scream, to writhe uncontrollably against the boundaries this life had set out for her – but, after all, it seemed that it was what she was destined to do, just struggle, be the poet, and be the visionary…
"But that somehow in the streets of London, on the ebb and flow of things, here, there, she survived."
London killed her as it provided the sustenance to allow her to write, which was what living was all about. She walked its streets, tormenting poor Leonard, filling her head with stories, seeing Mrs Dalloways everywhere she went…
Leonard had taken her from London, eventually, when she broke her promise, when she neared madness again, to Sussex, beautiful Sussex…beautiful to anyone who was not Virginia. Thomas, she thought blindly, thinking of the novelist she barely knew, yet felt she knew, as all novelists know each other, would have liked Sussex, though he was besotted with Dorset. How terribly vulgar! Dropping names, now.
Poor Vita. She thought briefly of Mrs Sackville-West, to whom she had penned the longest love letter in history, with whom she expressed some of those secret longings, to which Leonard, who was so very good, pretended to ignore or not notice at all…
"The truth is, I often like women. I like their unconventionality. I like their completeness. I like their anonymity."
How sad for him, she thought, as she donned her tweed coat and twined her scarf about her neck, ignoring how it tugged at the stray hairs that fell unflatteringly from her bun. What a sad presence she had wreaked upon the world, this terrible, terrible world…
She shivered, hearing the soft spluttering of an aeroplane above, leaving her cottage – their cottage – she corrected herself. She could at least do Leonard the one small honour of remembering he was her husband, in these last moments…
She hurried, not exactly frightened but not exactly what one would call calm either. She feared meeting Leonard, feared that he would force her into staying, force her into thought.
Thought! Thought! She didn't want to think, didn't need to think. With thinking brought madness, headaches and pain.
Thinking had destroyed her. How she would have liked to been one of those stupid, pathetic women who didn't think, who didn't endure deep thoughts, or bouts of madness – who didn't endure anything but their husbands infidelities.
"The eyes of others our prisons; their thoughts our cages."
How much easy life would have been had she not been born who she was – had she been less of a poet, less of a visionary – had she been Vanessa, who seemed to have struck a balance between majestic intelligence and normality.
How cold the Ouse looked – yet how calm. Calm was what she needed, calm and silence – Leonard would even agree with her on that. Virginia needed no stimulation that might bring madness upon her – Leonard would even argue that this state of heightened awareness was madness.
She stopped, looked around for a stone large enough to pull her to the bottom and hold her there, allowing the spring air to mist her breath and float away. Would she miss this? The feeling of air in her lungs, the sunlight on her face, the wind tugging at her hair?
Would she?
She would, she thought mildly, she would miss it. But it would not miss her.
"You cannot find peace by avoiding life."