Master of Her Art

When reading the Character in Fiction essay by Woolf, I was struck by the masterful way in which she writes. I was particularly impressed at the sort of mini story she writes about the old woman on the train. The way in which she writes is dripping with description, and her language is elevated and yet still somehow down to Earth in a relatively easy to read way. Her eloquent descriptions come in lines such as the one found on page 39 in which she describes the old woman as, "one of those clean, threadbare old ladies whose extreme tidiness--everything buttoned, fastened, tied together, mended and brushed up--suggests more extreme poverty than rags and dirt."The reader is left with a very distinct image of the kind of woman Mrs. Woolf is describing. She uses elevated language in instances such as on page 41 when she describes the woman stating, "The impression she made was overwhelming. It came pouring out like a draught, like a smell of burning." This idea of leaving an impression like "a smell of burning" seems over the top, yet perfectly (in my opinion) describes the idea she is trying to convey. I'm currently taking Creative Writing: Fiction, and a big part of that class is focused on character development. I guess this could be the reason I was so impacted by the words of Mrs. Woolf in this particular essay.