Waste Land to a Scream: A Gay Science

Novel 012

12. “It is impossible to suffer without making someone pay for it; every complaint already contains revenge.” Nietzsche

The Green, 21 February 1916

It was a long time before anyone would say Mrs. Dalloway in public but the idea had germinated even with the Bloomsbury group, of this we can say precisely but not exactly. It was a long day and night before the ruminations would fan out over and above the eves. Virginia Woolf looked at the burgeoning stars overhead and wondered which one was Jupiter because that one seemed to torment her so with a gaiety that was almost impish in its Melymbrosia paradox. She also thumbed through the book that had come out her name, eventually called The Voyage Out though she was not sure that she liked the title, the milieu and the title were somewhere in the vein of her intentions.

She flipped from page to page only at a few stanzas that attracted her, but already she was thinking of revising it for the streets were narrow from and to end from the Strand to the Embankment. But she hurried along past the doorway that she had ignored before because the owner had not even gained to give her a glance since last she intruded. She looked up at the second-story window and she saw a glowering head that looked at her but did not even notice her presence.

Realizing that she was upset for little ground, she brooded as she walked on the grounds of the green. The rains had ended a short time before and there was a quiet as if the sky had said there was nothing new from its description. Then at a distance, she saw her husband with a grim look on his face. It was quite different than any other visage that she had seen from him except once, and that she did not talk about, this one was a scowl bent from ear to ear in an ugly grimace that reminded her of the devil of her childhood.

He spoke: “The battle has begun.” He seemed uncomfortable in the night as if Euphrosyne called.

Turning the book over in her hands, she replied almost deferentially: “Why don’t you explain to me as if I were a woman who did not understand what ‘the battle’ and its implications were?” And for emphasis, she cropped her eyebrow with disdain.

“The Battle of Verdun has begun.”

“And how should I feel about this battle of Verdun?” Again the mock smile eclipsed her face.

Leonard Woolf was more than used to his wife’s coquettishness and the mock way that she pretended to be obtuse in the goings on in the front lines, so he was more than willing to dance aside and play seriously.

“It is clear that the Bosch, As the French call them, have had designs on Verdun. The French feel that the fortress is impregnable as it stands.”

Virginia Woolf became very serious in an instant: and toned down her antics. “ so what does this have to do with the endless war? You and I both know that it should never have gone on and therefore all I can ask is does this begin the stages of the end? Is it in the stars that peace rains out? Or is this just another faint on the miles of interment?”

At this point, he drooped his face and scowled. “At this point, only stars know the course of the battle.”

“Then I suggest we do not worry about the outcome if we do not know any more than the men in the trenches. The is of the bullets and the air of the shrapnel will take care course whatever we may think of it.”

“You may think of it as you like it, of course, but there are many who will lead and die because of the bloody battle which we are now ensconced with.”

“And my voice is quite small in regards to having done such a dastardly deed. The war will go on whether or not you or I design it prudent to go on. My voice was not in any way consulted.”

He stood there realizing that his rantings and railings had been listened to, and agreed with, but there was also a cold hard detachment in her tenor that said it was completely of no concern of hers.

And the battle would rage on for months and months having no concerns with what their opinion had on the effect.