[Sunday 5 September]

So it will be done, written over that is, in 3 weeks, I forecast, from today. What emerges? At this 
moment I'm casting about for an end. The problem is how to bring Lily & Mr R[amsay]. together & make 
a combination of interest at the end. I am feathering about with various ideas. The last chapter which I 
begin tomorrow is In the Boat: I had meant to end with R. climbing on to the rock. If so, what becomes 
[of] Lily & her picture? Should there be a final page about her & Carmichael looking at the picture & 
summing up R.'s character? In that case I lose the intensity of the moment. If this intervenes, between R. 
& the lighthouse, there's too much chop & change, I think. Could I do it in a parenthesis? so that one had 
the sense of reading the two things at the same time?

I shall solve it somehow, I suppose. Then I must go in to the question of quality. I think it may 
run too fast & free, & so be rather thin. On the other hand, I think it is subtler & more human than 
J[acob's] R[oom] & Mrs D[alloway]. And I am encouraged by my own abundance as I write. It is proved, 
I think, that what I have to say is to be said in this manner. As usual, side stories are sprouting in great 
variety as I wind this up: a book of characters; the whole string being pulled out from some simple 
sentence, like Clara Pater's, "Don't you find that Barker's pins have no points to them?" I think I can spin 
out all their entrails this way; but it is hopelessly undramatic. It is all in oratio obliqua. Not quite all; for 
I have a few direct sentences. The lyric portions of To the L. are collected in the 10 year lapse, & dont 
interfere with the text so much as usual. I feel as if it fetched its circle pretty completely this time: & I 
dont feel sure what the stock criticism will be. Sentimental? Victorian?

Then I must begin to plan out my book on literature for the Press. Six chapters. Why not groups 
of ideas, under some single heading—for example. Symbolism. God. Nature. Plot. Dialogue. Take a 
novel & see what the component parts are. Separate this, & bring under them instances of all the books 
which display them biggest. Probably this would pan out historically. One could spin a theory which wd 
bring the chapters together. I don't feel that I can read seriously[?] & exactly for it. Rather I want to sort 
out all the ideas that have accumulated in me.

Then I want to write a bunch of 'Outlines' to make money (for under a new arrangement, 
we're to share any money over £200 that I make): this I must leave rather to chance, according to what 
books come my way. I am frightfully contented these last few days, by the way. I dont quite understand 
it. Perhaps reason has something to do with it. Charleston & Tilton knocked me off my perch for a 
moment: Nessa & her children: Maynard & his carpets. My own gifts & shares seemed so moderate in 
comparison; my own fault too—a little more self control on my part, & we might have had a boy of 12, a 
girl of 10: This always rakes me wretched in the early hours. So I said, I am spoiling what I have. And 
thereupon settled [?] to exploit my own possessions to the full; I can make money & buy carpets; I can 
increase the pleasure of life enormously by living it carefully. No doubt, this is a rationalisation of a state 
which is not really of that nature. Probably I am very lucky. Mrs Allinson says she would like to look like 
me. Mary says I'm the only woman she loves. Nelly cooks admirably. Then, I am extremely happy 
walking on the downs. I dont want to be talking to Eddy at Charleston. I like to have space to spread my 
mind out in. Whatever I think, I can rap out, suddenly to L. We are somehow very detached, free, 
harmonious. I don't in the least want to hurry up & finish the time here. I want to go to Seaford & walk 
back over the downs; to go & see the house at East Chiltington; to breathe in more light & air; to see 
more grey hollows & gold cornfields & the first ploughed land shining white, with the gulls flickering. 
No: I dont want anyone to come here & interrupt. I am immensely busy. Hence I come to my moral, 
which is simply to enjoy what one does enjoy, without teasing oneself oh but Nessa has children, 
Maynard carpets. I might go & stay with Ethel [Sands, in Normandy]. For my own wishes are always 
definite enough to give me a lead, one way or another; & the chief joy in life is to follow these lights; I 
am now almost entirely surrounded by sheep. God knows, I wish we could buy the terrace, & have a 
garden all round the lodge—but this is not a serious diminution of joy.

Clive & Mary came over yesterday in brilliant sun. We sat on the millstones. (one sheep 
has a tail like a bell-rope—the others are all bit short.) Wells. Hardy. Maynard. Richardson. [word 
illegible]. Christabel—going to Greece for a month with Lesley Jowitt. Maupassant's metaphors —
The Questionnaire. Lytton's harem—Their dulness—Carrington a cook who doesn't go out on Sundays. 
Whether Eddy is clever or not. Tonks & Steer & Moore—Tonks in love with Mary, Clive insists; she is 
modest. So we talked. Then I drove with them to the Laye, walked up the down behind Asheham & let all 
that wind & sun blow through the crazy sails of my old windmill, which gives me so much pleasure still. 
I forget what I thought about: did not think, I suppose; was all in a thrill of emotion at my being liked by 
Mary & being a success, &c. Home to music, my new 15/- table, talk with L.: a sense of great happiness 
& ease. Went & looked at the stars, but could not get quite the right sense of amazement (I can get this 
really well at times) because L. said

"Now come in. Its too cold to be out"