The Common Reader - First Series

Virginia Woolf

Description

This is Woolf's first and most popular volume of essays. This collection has more than twenty-five selections, including such important statements as "Modern Fiction" and "The Modern Essay."
Virginia Woolf is well known as one of the most prominent fiction writers of the twentieth century, what may be less well known is her astounding collection of letters and essays. Here in this collection aimed at 'the Common reader', Woolf produced an eccentric and personal literary and social history of European thought in her own unique style. This collection helped cement Woolf as one of the most popular writers of her time.

Informations

• Publié par: Rare Treasure Editions
• Date de parution: 09 novembre 2021
• Nombre de lectures: 0
• EAN13: 9781774644119
• Langue: English

Extrait

The Common Reader - First Series
by Virginia Woolf

First published in 1925
This edition published by Rare Treasures
Victoria, BC Canada with branch offices in the Czech Republic and Germany
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All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage or retrieval system, except in the case of excerpts by a reviewer, who may quote brief passages in a review.
THE COMMON READER
FIRST SERIES

by VIRGINIA WOOLF
TO LYTTON STRACHEY






Some of these papers appeared originally in the TimesLiterary Supplement , the Athenæum , the Nation andAthanæum , the New Statesman , the London Mercury ,the Dial (New York); the New Republic (New York),and I have to thank the editors for allowing me to reprintthem here. Some are based upon articles written for variousnewspapers, while others appear now for the first time.


THE COMMON READER
There is a sentence in Dr. Johnson's Life ofGray which might well be written up in all thoserooms, too humble to be called libraries, yet full ofbooks, where the pursuit of reading is carried on byprivate people. "… I rejoice to concur with thecommon reader; for by the common sense of readers,uncorrupted by literary prejudices, after all the refinementsof subtilty and the dogmatism of learning,must be finally decided all claim to poetical honours."It defines their qualities; it dignifies their aims; itbestows upon a pursuit which devours a great deal oftime, and is yet apt to leave behind it nothing verysubstantial, the sanction of the great man's approval.
The common reader, as Dr. Johnson implies,differs from the critic and the scholar. He is worseeducated, and nature has not gifted him so generously.He reads for his own pleasure rather than to impartknowledge or correct the opinions of others. Aboveall, he is guided by an instinct to create for himself,out of whatever odds and ends he can come by, somekind of whole—a portrait of a man, a sketch of an age,a theory of the art of writing. He never ceases, as hereads, to run up some rickety and ramshackle fabricwhich shall give him the temporary satisfaction oflooking sufficiently like the real object to allow ofaffection, laughter, and argument. Hasty, inaccurate,and superficial, snatching now this poem, now thatscrap of old furniture, without caring where he findsit or of what nature it may be so long as it serves hispurpose and rounds his structure, his deficiencies as acritic are too obvious to be pointed out; but if he has,as Dr. Johnson maintained, some say in the finaldistribution of poetical honours, then, perhaps, it maybe worth while to write down a few of the ideas andopinions which, insignificant in themselves, yet contributeto so mighty a result.


THE PASTONS AND CHAUCER 1
The tower of Caister Castle still rises ninetyfeet into the air, and the arch still stands fromwhich Sir John Fastolf's barges sailed out to fetchstone for the building of the great castle. But nowjackdaws nest on the tower, and of the castle, whichonce covered six acres of ground, only ruined wallsremain, pierced by loop-holes and surmounted bybattlements, though there are neither archers withinnor cannon without. As for the "seven religiousmen" and the "seven poor folk" who should, at thisvery moment, be praying for the souls of Sir John andhis parents, there is no sign of them nor sound of theirprayers. The place is a ruin. Antiquaries speculateand differ.
Not so very far off lie more ruins—the ruins ofBromholm Priory, where John Paston was buried,naturally enough, since his house was only a mile orso away, lying on low ground by the sea, twenty milesnorth of Norwich. The coast is dangerous, and theland, even in our time, inaccessible. Nevertheless, thelittle bit of wood at Bromholm, the fragment of thetrue Cross, brought pilgrims incessantly to the Priory,and sent them away with eyes opened and limbsstraightened. But some of them with their newly-openedeyes saw a sight which shocked them—thegrave of John Paston in Bromholm Priory without atombstone. The news spread over the country-side.The Pastons had fallen; they that had been so powerfulcould no longer afford a stone to put above JohnPaston's head. Margaret, his widow, could notpay her debts; the eldest son, Sir John, wasted hisproperty upon women and tournaments, while theyounger, John also, though a man of greater parts,thought more of his hawks than of his harvests.
The pilgrims of course were liars, as people whoseeyes have just been opened by a piece of the trueCross have every right to be; but their news, none theless, was welcome. The Pastons had risen in theworld. People said even that they had been bondmennot so very long ago. At any rate, men still livingcould remember John's grandfather Clement tillinghis own land, a hard-working peasant; and William,Clement's son, becoming a judge and buying land; andJohn, William's son, marrying well and buying moreland and quite lately inheriting the vast new castle atCaister, and all Sir John's lands in Norfolk and Suffolk.People said that he had forged the old knight's will.What wonder, then, that he lacked a tombstone? But,if we consider the character of Sir John Paston, John'seldest son, and his upbringing and his surroundings,and the relations between himself and his father as thefamily letters reveal them, we shall see how difficult itwas, and how likely to be neglected—this business ofmaking his father's tombstone.
For let us imagine, in the most desolate part ofEngland known to us at the present moment, a raw,new-built house, without telephone, bathroom or drains,arm-chairs or newspapers, and one shelf perhaps ofbooks, unwieldy to hold, expensive to come by. Thewindows look out upon a few cultivated fields and adozen hovels, and beyond them there is the sea on oneside, on the other a vast fen. A single road crosses thefen, but there is a hole in it, which, one of the farmhands reports, is big enough to swallow a carriage.And, the man adds, Tom Topcroft, the mad bricklayer,has broken loose again and ranges the country half-naked,threatening to kill anyone who approaches him.That is what they talk about at dinner in the desolatehouse, while the chimney smokes horribly, and thedraught lifts the carpets on the floor. Orders aregiven to lock all gates at sunset, and, when the longdismal evening has worn itself away, simply andsolemnly, girt about with dangers as they are, theseisolated men and women fall upon their knees inprayer.
In the fifteenth century, however, the wild landscapewas broken suddenly and very strangely by vast pilesof brand-new masonry. There rose out of the sand-hillsand heaths of the Norfolk coast a huge bulkof stone, like a modern hotel in a watering-place;but there was no parade, no lodging-houses, and nopier at Yarmouth then, and this gigantic buildingon the outskirts of the town was built to house onesolitary old gentleman without any children—Sir JohnFastolf, who had fought at Agincourt and acquiredgreat wealth. He had fought at Agincourt and gotbut little reward. No one took his advice. Menspoke ill of him behind his back. He was wellaware of it; his temper was none the sweeter for that.He was a hot-tempered old man, powerful, embitteredby a sense of grievance. But whether on the battle-fieldor at court he thought perpetually of Caister,and how, when his duties allowed, he would settledown on his father's land and live in a great houseof his own building.
The gigantic structure of Caister Castle was inprogress not so many miles away when the littlePastons were children. John Paston, the father, hadcharge of some part of the business, and the childrenlistened, as soon as they could listen at all, to talk ofstone and building, of barges gone to London and notyet returned, of the twenty-six private chambers, ofthe hall and chapel; of foundations, measurements,and rascally work-people. Later, in 1454, when thework was finished and Sir John had come to spend hislast years at Caister, they may have seen for themselvesthe mass of treasure that was stored there; the tablesladen with gold and silver plate; the wardrobesstuffed with gowns of velvet and satin and cloth ofgold, with hoods and tippets and beaver hats andleather jackets and velvet doublets; and how the verypillow-cases on the beds were of green and purple silk.There were tapestries everywhere. The beds werelaid and the bedrooms hung with tapestries representingsieges, hunting and hawking, men fishing, archersshooting, ladies playing on their harps, dallying withducks, or a giant "bearing the leg of a bear in hishand". Such were the fruits of a well-spent life. Tobuy land, to build great houses, to stuff these housesfull of gold and silver plate (though the privy mightwell be in the bedroom), was the proper aim of mankind.Mr. and Mrs. Paston spent the greater part of theirenergies in the same exhausting occupation. Forsince the passion to acquire was universal, one couldnever rest secure in one's possessions for long. Theoutlying parts of one's property were in perpetualjeopardy. The Duke of Norfolk might covet thismanor, the Duke of Suffolk that. Some trumped-upexcuse, as for instance that the Pastons were bondmen,gave them the right to seize the house and batter downthe lodges in the owner's absence. And how couldthe owner of Paston and Mauteby and Drayton andGresham be in five or six places at once, especially nowthat Caister Castle was his, and he must be in Londontrying to get his rights recognised by the King? TheKing was mad too, they said; did not know his ownchild, they said; or the King was in flight; or there