Trust in dogs and roses
When humans fail you, dogs and roses remain, which has the advantage of simplifying the business of living and stripping...
Of life, lovers, spaniels and sympathy
Orlando's four hundred year span seems to boil down to the search for Life, Love and Authorship. Here she is...
From tapers to tinder
I loved this description of a young boy going to all lengths to be able to read as much as...
Hodden brown
The notes to Virginia Woolf's Orlando say 'hodden' is a coarse, woollen cloth and the word therefore came to mean...
Of violet eyes
Only the second example I have come across of violet eyes, never yet seen in real life. Here the 76th...
The vegetables of another age
Something wonderfully down to earth about this quick survey of differences between us and the Elizabethans, particularly in that last...
Up and out at dawn
Orlando, who at this stage in her 400 year life has only quite recently woken up to find herself transformed...
Tent-shaped sides
This tent-like landscape reminds me of the Costa Rican volcano in Arenal which also looks as if a volcanic shake...
Plaid-like juxtapositions
Orlando, born in the 16th century and at home in the 17th and 18th, seems to suffer aesthetic culture shock...
Bright as lamps, haggard as …
Never thought of dawn as being haggard, though an insomniac crawling into it after a restless night might be. 'Bright...
Wicker cradle, basket pram
A bassinette (generally spelled 'bassinet') was an oblong wicker basket with a hood at one end, used as a cradle...
Million-candled tree
This is Sasha's description of her glittering English aristocratic lover, but she doesn't seem particularly dazzled by his brightness. He...
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