Virginia Woolf's 80 Best Phrases
Adeline Virginia Stephen, better known in the literary world as Virginia Woolf, was an English writer, short story writer and creator of plays. She was one of the most powerful influences on feminism during the 20th century, challenging the rigid gender roles associated with women and reinforced by the puritanism of the Victorian era; Likewise, she became one of the most prominent representatives of the Anglo-Saxon modernism avant-garde movement.
In this selection of Virginia Woolf's best quotes You will find a sample of the ideas and philosophy of life of this author.
Virginia Woolf's most memorable phrases
Despite leaving us several teachings about moving forward in life despite the bad times and emotions dark, she could never free herself from the clutches of depression and melancholy, which made her succumb to ending her life.
However, we bring this compilation of Virginia Woolf's phrases and thoughts to remember her literary and feminist legacy.
1. There is no barrier, lock, or bolt that you can impose on the freedom of my mind.
No one can put limits on our mind.
2. Life is a dream, waking up is what kills us.
Facing the distressing day to day brings us a difficult burden to overcome.
3. You can not find peace by avoiding life.
Ignoring what is happening to you only makes everything worse.
4. Beauty must be broken daily to remain beautiful.
The beauty is in what defies the normal.
5. A woman must have money and a room of her own if she is going to write fiction.
An interesting advice on productive writing for women.
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6. Love is an illusion, a story that one builds in her mind, aware all the time that it is not true, and so she is careful not to destroy the illusion.
Do you think that love is nothing more than an illusion?
7. Since no one can tell me if writing is bad or good, the only sure value is one's own pleasure. I'm sure about that.
No one can guess what is right or wrong in writing.
8. Silence is better… Let me sit with the naked things, this cup of coffee, this knife, this fork, things in themselves, being myself.
We all need a moment alone to reflect.
9. Books are the mirrors of the soul.
Books are also a necessity for our growth.
10. I really don't like human nature unless it's all spiced up with art.
Humanity always surprises us, both for better and for worse.
11. Her brain was in perfect condition. Surely the world was to blame for not being able to feel.
Sometimes we have to adapt to things we can't control.
12. Women have lived all these centuries as wives, with the magical and delicious power to reflect the figure of man twice his natural size.
Women who could only magnify the figure of their husbands.
13. I wanted to write about everything, about the life we have and the lives we could have had. I wanted to write about all the possible ways to die.
A clear sign of his obsession with that thin thread that separates life from death.
14. There is nothing so rare when you are in love as the total indifference of others.
When we are in love we tend to ignore the rest of the world around us.
15. You can't bring children into a world like this; one cannot consider perpetuating suffering, nor increasing the breed of these lustful animals that do not They do not possess lasting emotions, but only whims and banalities that lead you one way now and the other tomorrow. other.
A controversial thought that can now come to light, with the decision of women to be mothers or not.
16. I feel like I'm going crazy again. I don't think we can go through one of those terrible times again. And I can't recover this time.
Part of her suicide letter that she left to her husband.
17. When you think of things like the stars, our affairs don't seem to matter much, do they?
Part of the complexity of our problems only lives in our mind.
18. Because it is a great pity to never say what one feels...
When you silence what you carry inside, you end up exploding in a negative way.
19. It is not catastrophes, murders, deaths, diseases that age us and kill us; it's the way everyone else looks and laughs and walks up the bus steps.
What really hurts us is the ease with which others seem to lead their lives, without any problems.
20. Literature is littered with the remains of men who have cared beyond reason for the opinions of others.
Literature is a space where everyone can express themselves, as long as they have something to say.
21. To enjoy freedom, we have to control ourselves.
Freedom is not an excuse to forget about our responsibilities.
22. Nothing has really happened until it has been registered.
What we know has happened is because it has been written in history.
23. Growing up is losing some illusions to start having others.
Part of growing up is letting go of a few things to start looking for new dreams.
24. If they stuck to their own experience, they would always feel that this is not what they want, that there is nothing more boring and childish and inhuman than love, but that, at the same time, it is beautiful and necessary.
Love is a goal that many aspire to reach, because we need to be accompanied.
25. The depths of the sea are just water after all.
A metaphor that makes us see that our fears are only small parts together in one.
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26. Women have enjoyed less intellectual freedom than the children of Athenian slaves. Women have therefore not had the slightest opportunity to write poetry.
A harsh criticism of the intellectual slavery that the women of her time had.
27. The history of most women is hidden by silence or by adornments that amount to silence.
How many lost or hidden achievements will exist, by people who silenced their creators.
28. The extraordinary woman depends on the ordinary woman.
We all have the capacity to be great people.
29. The future is dark, I think it's the best for the future.
The future is uncertain.
30. Writing is like sex. First you do it for love, then for your friends, and then for money.
An interesting way to explain his evolution in writing.
31. As long as you write what you want to write, that's all that matters; and whether it matters for years or only for hours, no one can say.
Every writer defies the rules in his stories, because it is his form of freedom.
32. The history of male resistance to female emancipation is almost more interesting than the history of emancipation itself.
Men who, for different reasons, believe that they should diminish the power of women.
33. We have a strange power to change facts with the power of imagination.
Our memories can be altered at our convenience.
34. I have searched for happiness through many ages and have not found it.
Happiness is an option that we decide to have every day.
35. How many times have people used a pencil or brush because they couldn't pull the trigger?
Many artists find in their works a way out of their misfortunes.
36. And all the lives we've ever lived and all the lives to come are filled with trees and changing leaves.
Life cannot be static.
37. I am rooted, but I flow.
We can get by with our willpower, just to get out of the dark a bit.
38. And yet the only exciting life is the imaginary one.
We all need an escape from this harsh reality.
39. Through suffering knowledge is achieved.
Many people believe that pain is the best experience.
40. The eyes of others are our prisons; your thoughts, our cages.
When we are clinging to the opinion of others, we refuse to live how we really want.
41. Often on a wet day I start counting; What I have read and what I have not read.
It is those gray moments that most attract the heat of a book.
42. Nothing thicker than a blade separates happiness from melancholy
Melancholy is made of happy moments that we miss living again.
43. Some people go to the priests; others to poetry; me to my friends
How many own secrets our friends carry.
44. Language is wine on the lips.
A cultured person will always be attractive.
45. Death is the enemy. Death is what I ride against with my sword sheathed and my hair blowing in the wind.
Despite moving away from death, Virginia succumbed to the need to snuff out her existence.
46. Some things were very beautiful; other nonsense nonsense.
Our mind can give unnecessary importance to things that happen to us.
47. Never let anyone guess that you have a mind of your own. Above all be pure.
Save your best cards for when you need it.
48. It is writing, not being read, that excites me. The joy is in doing.
More than having readers, it was being able to vent in their stories.
49. My biggest wish was always to increase the night to be able to fill it with dreams.
Many artists are inspired by the night hours.
50. Yes, I deserve spring, I owe nothing to anyone.
You do not need to explain to anyone about your life.
51. All extreme feelings are associated with madness.
The truth is that extreme emotions can alter our mood.
52. The nerve that controls the pen winds around every fiber of our being, threads through the heart, through the liver.
Writing from the inside.
53. I'm reading six books at once, the only way to read; for, as you will agree, a book is just one note without accompaniment, and to get the full sound, one needs ten others at the same time.
Are you one of those who read one or more books at the same time?
54. Second-hand books are wild books, homeless books; they have gathered in vast flocks of variegated feather, and have a charm that the tame volumes in the library lack.
All books have great value, even if some are only carried away by their cover.
55. I begin to desire a parsimonious language like the one used by lovers, broken words, broken words, like the rubbing of footsteps on the sidewalk.
There are people who have their own language, like couples or friends.
56. How many forgotten women because not even they themselves could, can or will be able to say 'this mouth is mine', 'this body is mine', 'this is what I think'.
Regretting the secrecy that women had to keep to please society.
57. Our hate can hardly be differentiated from our love.
She well says that from love to hate there is only one step.
58. I believe that all novels deal with character and that it is to express character, not the dream of doctrines, the singing of songs or celebrating the glories of the British Empire that the form of the novel, so rich and elastic and alive, goes evolving.
What the novels represented for Virginia.
59. I can only notice that the past is beautiful because one is never aware of an emotion in the moment. It expands later, and therefore we don't have full emotions about the present, only about the past.
According to Virginia, we tend to better appreciate things when they have already happened, instead of when we are living it.
60. We inevitably regard society, so nice to you, so hard on us, as an inadequate form that distorts the truth; warps the mind; shackles the will
Society is usually good to those who pay attention to their way of running the world.
61. I like that people are unhappy because I like that they have souls.
People who are always cheerful, without a hint of sorrow, tend to hide something.
62. Humor is the first of the gifts to perish in a foreign language.
A reference to the fact that translations can affect the way something is narrated.
63. A self that keeps changing is a self that continues to live.
Change is what allows us to move forward, without anything stopping us.
64. I do myself and I do myself continuously. Each person extracts different words from me.
We all have the right to change as many times as we want.
65. I start hearing voices, and I can't concentrate. So I do what seems to me the best thing to do. You have given me the greatest possible happiness.
Sometimes our partner becomes an anchor of reality.
66. And she once again felt alone in the presence of her eternal antagonist: her life.
Virginia had this love-hate relationship with life, because she wanted to enjoy it, but something prevented her.
67. Everything is ephemeral like the rainbow.
Nothing stays the same forever. Everything changes.
68. We are nauseated by the sight of trivial personalities rotting in the eternity of print.
Showing contempt for those superficial and conformist people.
69. You can't think well, love well, sleep well, if you haven't eaten well.
Eating should represent a necessary pillar of our physical and emotional health.
70. The truth is that writing is the deepest pleasure, being read to is only a superficial pleasure.
Many writers work to please themselves, as a necessity that they cannot avoid.
71. Every secret of a writer's soul, every experience of his life, every attribute of his mind, are amply written in his work.
Every book, novel, poetry and work, has a bit of its authors.
72. If you don't tell the truth about yourself, you can't tell the truth about other people.
You cannot single out someone for their actions, but you are responsible for your own actions.
73. When I can't see the words that curl like smoke rings around me, I'm in the dark, I'm nothing.
Her way of escaping from those negative feelings that tormented her was her writing.
74. I feel that all the shadows of the universe multiply deep within my skin.
A reference to the melancholy that never left her.
75. It is obvious that women's values often differ from the values created by the other sex and yet it is masculine values that predominate.
A critique of society's demands for men and women.
76. As a woman I have no homeland, as a woman I don't want a homeland. As a woman, my homeland is the world.
We belong where we call home, no matter where it is.
77. For most of history, Anonymous was a woman.
Unfortunately, many women were unable to publicly develop their talents.
78. There is no need to rush. There is no need to shine. You don't need to be anyone but yourself.
This life is not a race, the real goal is to seek our happiness.
79. Loving separates us from others.
When couples are created, we move away from friendships a bit.
80. Each one had their past locked up within themselves, like the pages of a book they had learned by heart; and his friends could only read the title.
All people have a past that we carry inside without being able to forget.
