Waves

The Waves is a novel (first published in 1931) by Virginia Woolf. The book is a narrative in Woolf's infamous stream-of-consciousness style. Here, Woolf gives into experimentation, as the six friends are lulled--drawn with the wave-like movement of reflection.

In The Waves, Woolf writes: "I wish then after this somnolence to sparkle, many-faceted under the light of my friends' faces. I have been traversing the sunless territory of non-identity. A strange land. I have heard in my moment of appeasement, in my moment of obliterating satisfaction, the sigh, as it goes in, comes out, of the tide that draws beyond this circle of bright light, this drumming of innate fury."

She also writes: "I need a little language such as lovers use, words of one syllable such as children speak when they come into the room and find their mother sewing and pick up some scrap of bright wool, a feather, or a shred of chintz."

Cover Art © Harcourt.