- larknounChapter 1 →
A small bird known for singing very early in the morning; 'up with the lark' means awake and out of bed at the very first light of dawn.
“"But you'll have to be up with the lark," she added.”
- drawing-roomnounChapter 1 →
A formal sitting room in a large house, used for receiving and entertaining guests, separate from the dining room or family rooms.
“"But," said his father, stopping in front of the drawing-room window, "it won't be fine."”
- pokernounChapter 1 →
A heavy metal rod kept by a fireplace and used for stirring or adjusting burning coals; here imagined as a weapon capable of causing serious injury.
“Had there been an axe handy, or a poker, any weapon that would have gashed a hole in his father's breast and killed him”
- gashedverbChapter 1 →
Cut or slashed open with a deep, jagged wound, as if by a blade or sharp instrument.
“any weapon that would have gashed a hole in his father's breast and killed him, there and then, James would have seized it.”
- mergingverbChapter 2 →
Blending separate people or feelings together into a single unified whole, smoothing over differences so that a group feels connected.
“The whole of the effort of merging and flowing and creating rested on her.”
- fluiditynounChapter 2 →
A state of constant, shapeless change and uncertainty — here, the threatening, unstable world outside the warmth and order of the dinner party.
“They were all conscious of making a party together in a hollow, on an island; had their common cause against that fluidity out there.”
- hollownounChapter 2 →
A sheltered, enclosed low space; used here to suggest the small, protected circle the dinner guests form against the vast and indifferent world around them.
“They were all conscious of making a party together in a hollow, on an island; had their common cause against that fluidity out there.”
- massesnounChapter 3 →
In painting, the large areas of shape, colour, or tone that together give a composition its structure and visual weight.
“It was a question, she supposed, of the relations of masses, of lights and shadows.”
- twilightnounChapter 4 →
The soft, dim light that fills the sky just after the sun has set but before full darkness falls.
“composed, as they had not been in the twilight, into a party round a table.”
- composedverbChapter 4 →
Brought together and arranged into a harmonious, settled group, the way a painter arranges figures in a picture.
- airsnounChapter 5 →
Gentle, wandering currents of air or faint breezes, here described as if they are living creatures moving quietly through the empty house.
“Only through the rusty hinges and swollen sea-moistened woodwork certain airs, detached from the body of the wind, crept …”
- swollenadjectiveChapter 5 →
Expanded and warped from absorbing moisture; wooden frames and boards that have soaked up damp air and no longer fit their original shape.
“Only through the rusty hinges and swollen sea-moistened woodwork certain airs, detached from the body of the wind, crept …”
- shroudedadjectiveChapter 5 →
Covered over with cloths or sheets to protect from dust during a long period of disuse, giving furniture a ghostly, hidden appearance.
“Loveliness and stillness clasped hands in the bedroom, and among the shrouded jugs and sheeted chairs even the prying of the wind”
- clammyadjectiveChapter 5 →
Unpleasantly damp and cold to the touch, like the wet salt air that drifts in from the sea.
“the soft nose of the clammy sea airs, rubbing, snuffling, iterati…”
- iteratingverbChapter 5 →
Repeating the same action or sound over and over again, here describing the wind's endless, monotonous probing of the empty house.
“the soft nose of the clammy sea airs, rubbing, snuffling, iterati…”
- instantaneousadjectiveChapter 6 →
Happening in an instant, with no interval of time; used here to mean death came so suddenly there was no suffering.
“Andrew Ramsay, whose death, mercifully, was instantaneous.”
- mercifullyadverbChapter 6 →
In a way that spares someone from pain or suffering; here expressing relief that the death was too quick for the victim to experience agony.
“Andrew Ramsay, whose death, mercifully, was instantaneous.”
- dissolvingverbChapter 6 →
Losing clear shape and definition, fading into vagueness as if melting away — here describing how a figure seems to blur and disappear into surrounding mist.
“his boat-shaped body, his hands, his face, all seemed to her to be dissolving in the mist.”
- behovedverbChapter 7 →
Was the proper duty or obligation of someone; an old-fashioned way of saying it was the right or expected thing for a person to do.
“wondering whether, since she had been left alone, it behoved her to go to the kitchen to fetch another cup of coffee”
- gulfnounChapter 7 →
A wide, deep gap or chasm that is very difficult to cross; here used to describe the emotional distance between two people that has suddenly been bridged.
“She felt as if she had leapt across a gulf and landed on the other side of a wall.”
- flickeredverbChapter 7 →
Moved with quick, light, unsteady strokes, the way a flame wavers; here describing the rapid, tentative movement of a paintbrush across canvas.
“The brush descended. It flickered brown over the white canvas; it left a running mark.”
- silveryadjectiveChapter 8 →
Gleaming with a pale, soft, metallic shine like polished silver; here describing the distant lighthouse seen through sea haze.
“The Lighthouse was then a silvery, misty-looking tower with a yellow eye that opened suddenly and softly in the evening.”
- rouseverbChapter 8 →
To stir oneself out of silence, stillness, or inward withdrawal and make an effort to speak or act.
“But she felt him trying to rouse himself. Then he said, 'Well done.'”
- extreme fatiguephraseChapter 8 →
A state of total exhaustion, both physical and emotional, that comes after a long and draining effort has finally been completed.
“Yes, she thought, laying down her brush in extreme fatigue, I have h…”
To the LighthouseNovel by Virginia Woolf