28 October 1929 – 3 November 1929

Oh but I have done quite well so far with Room of One’s Own; and it sells, I think; and I get unexpected letters. But I am more concerned with my Waves. I’ve just typed out my morning’s work; and can’t feel altogether sure. There is something there (as I felt about Mrs. Dalloway) but I can’t get at it, squarely; nothing like the speed and certainty of the Lighthouse: Orlando mere child’s play. Is there some falsity of method, somewhere? Something tricky?—so that the interesting things aren’t firmly based? I am in an odd state; feel a cleavage; here’s my interesting thing; and there’s no quite solid table on which to put it. It might come in a flash, on re-reading—some solvent. I am convinced that I am right to seek for a station whence I can set my people against time and the sea— but Lord, the difficulty of digging oneself in there, with conviction. Yesterday I had conviction; it has gone today.