"...one must describe the weather."

I don't know that one must, but Virginia Woolf certainly does, to a great extent, in her diaries.  However, as I'm only three years in, I can't say with any certainty that the trend will continue, but she does love to lament the wind and rain and honor the clear, sunny days. 

I came by VW my senior year in high school when I read A Room of One's Own for a class project.  To the best of my recollection, it was a compilation of feminist essays based on lectures she had given at two universities in England.  I do remember that I promptly bought up a few of her novels shortly thereafter and made it a mission to read her diaries. 

The closest I got was in college when I read a few pages from A Writer's Diary, which were selections from her full diary by her husband, Leonard, after her death.  Things got in the way of me ever finishing that book and graduating to the complete five volumes, despite the refrain of that Indigo Girls song in my head.

So more than ten years later I've decided to just do it and crack open those volumes.  At more than 300 pages each, it won't be a quick process, but I hope it will be an enjoyable one.  So far, it has.

The weather aside, VW is quite adept at characterizing the people in her life.  She draws caricatures of these writers, artists, and politicians that are quite entertaining.  I have also noticed a tendency to compare people to dogs.  She loves to gossip, and there is some question as to her honesty, according to Anne Olivier Bell, who edited the diaries. 

The diary has also illustrated life in London during the first World War, albeit rather casually.  The way she talks about raids and bunking down in the kitchen until the all-clear sounded is presented in almost the same tone as the weather.  I sense her get more fired up about the cost of goods and their availability during this time more than anything.  When the first volume begins, her first novel, The Voyage Out, gets published and yet she mentions it but once.  She appears to have more interest in her husband's successes, which was kind of sweet to behold.  In these early years, she has no doubt of Leonard's talents.

I've only just begun.  I'm currently in 1918 and the diaries end in 1941, just days before her suicide.  I've a lot of life left to go.  But, even in these first years, I am taken aback by her insights into human nature.  No wonder I feel so comfortable around her, even though we are lifetimes apart.