How we cite our quotes: (Paragraph)
Quote #1
From the oval-shaped flower-bed there rose perhaps a hundred stalks spreading into heart-shaped or tongue-shaped leaves half way up and unfurling at the tip red or blue or yellow petals marked with sports of colour raised upon the surface; and from the red, blue or yellow gloom of the throat emerged a straight bar, rough with gold dust and slightly clubbed at the end. (1)
The narrator seems awed here by the sheer beauty of the flowers. The extreme detail of Woolf's prose serves to communicate a sense of pure amazement at the wonders of the natural world. What does this expression of awe contribute to the story? How does it affect our overall reading?
Quote #2
Brown cliffs with deep green lakes in the hollows, flat, blade-like trees that waved from root to tip, round boulders of grey stone, vast crumpled surfaces of a thin crackling texture—all these objects lay across the snail's progress between one stalk and another to his goal. (10)
There's amazement here on two levels: the snail's amazement at the vast obstacles that he must overcome but also the narrator's amazement at the hidden life of the snail—what an incredible little world he inhabits. Woolf's attention to the troubles of the snail's life draws out the story's wonder at the intricacies of nature that can so easily go overlooked.
Quote #3
He talked almost incessantly; he smiled to himself and again began to talk, as if the smile had been an answer. He was talking about spirits—the spirits of the dead, who, according to him, were even now telling him all sorts of odd things about their experiences in Heaven. (11)
The old man seems to be in awe of the spirits he communicates with…who wouldn't be? His amazement at this phenomenon is part of what animates his character, making him such a spectacle for the other characters to watch. His sense of wonder also draws him away from the present moment in the garden. Hmm…we're starting to notice a pattern here—why is everyone so easily distracted?