“By conviction an atheist perhaps, he is taken by surprise with moments of extraordinary exaltation. Nothing exists outside us except a state of mind, he thinks; a desire for solace, for relief, for something outside these miserable pigmies, these feeble, these ugly these craven men and women. But if he can conceive of her, then in some sort she exists, he thinks, and advancing down the path with his eyes upon the sky and branches he rapidly endows them with womanhood; sees with amazement how grave they become; how majestically, as the breeze stirs them, they dispense with a dark flutter of the leaves charity, comprehension, absolution, and then, flinging themselves suddenly aloft, confound the piety of their aspect with a wild carouse” (57).
Woolf uses this passage to take a step away from the individual characters in the novel and state a general truth about the world through an archetype: the “traveler.” Using a traveler to represent this general truth about discovery is appropriate because every person is in theory a traveler through life. Woolf herself grew up in an agnostic family and her religious beliefs are seen here. Although she grew up as an “atheist” it is possible that she “[was] taken by surprise with moments of extraordinary exaltation.” Woolf suggests that life is defined merely by how we see it, as nothing is really around us “except a state of mind.” Through the rest of the novel, Woolf displays this belief by showing the world from many different character’s points of view. All any person wants is an escape of sorts from the “pigmies” found in the world. Here, Woolf represents God, who is the escape, as a female which reveals her feminist views. Much of Woolf’s writing career was geared toward exposing women’s roles and displaying the fact that they too had important lives. One topic in particular that she dedicated her literature to was women’s lives. She herself states in 1927 that “very little is known about women” and she was concerned with the fact that “very few women yet have written truthful autobiographies.” By portraying God as a female - as opposed to the normal “He” - Woolf shows her desire for more sexual equality in the world. Woolf further develops this belief by representing females with a tree. Trees are one of the basic necessities of life. This represents women’s strong rooted positions in life. The leaves which are vessels of women’s strength are scattered around the world bringing “charity, comprehension, [and] absolution.” This symbolizes what women could bring to the world with greater influence.
Works Cited:
Lee, Hermione. “Virginia Woolf.” The New York Times. 1997. The New York Times Company. 3 Oct. 2010 <http://www.nytimes.com/books/first/l/lee-woolf.html>.
Nicolson, Nigel. “Virginia Woolf.” The New York Times. 2000. The New York Times Company. 3 Oct. 2010 <http://www.nytimes.com/books/first/n/nicolson-woolf.html>.
Photo Credit:
Vaughan, Beth. "The Harper in Fairyland." Spirit of Trees. 24 Oct. 2010 <http://www.spiritoftrees.org/folktales/vaughan/harper_in_fairyland.html>.
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