Virginia Woolf Quotes

The unfolding of the bare human soul...that is what interests me.

I am like a woman. I have a woman inside me.

My primary interest has always been about exploring the human psyche and humanity.

Even the roughest character, underneath all that hurt, is someone who wants to love and be loved.

Beyond the beauty, the sex, the titillation, the surface, there is a human being. And that has to emerge.

I actually think it's harder to play vulnerability, because you're having to delve deeper into portions of your own psyche, what it is that makes you human.

I think if you write about human relationships, you're always exploring the psyche and the soul. I don't separate certain - perhaps more extreme - things that people do from others.

The best writing really does come from the deepest, most private part of you.

Acting, to me, is about the incredible adventure of examining the landscape of human heart and soul. That's basically what we do.

The human body is the best picture of the human soul.

There are so many ways in which the heart of man conceals itself from man!

I am expressive but secretive about my emotions.

To me, acting used to be just, 'Get my face out there, get girls, make a little bit of money, make my mom proud.' It was just like sports. But there were moments in 'Moonlight' that I really felt like I had to know why he is the way he is. Or just people in general - why this person walks around with a frown on their face instead of a smile.

There is within every human being a deep well of thinking over which a heavy iron lid is kept clamped.

If a bell failed to ring, if a stove smoked, if a wheel on a machine stuck, you knew at once where to look and did so with alacrity; you found the defect and knew how to cure it. But the thing within you, the secret mainspring that alone gave meaning to life, the thing within us that alone is living, alone is capable of feeling pleasure and pain, of craving happiness and experiencing it- that was unknown. You knew nothing about that, nothing at all, and if the mainspring failed there was no cure. Wasn't it insane?

Most grown people are like icebergs, three-tenths showing, seven-tenths submerged - that is why a collision with one of them is unexpectedly hurtful.

When people concentrate on the idea of beauty, they are, without realizing it, confronted with the darkest thoughts that exist in this world. That, I suppose, is how human beings are made.

I sometimes feel that I'm impersonating the dark unconscious of the whole human race. I know this sounds sick, but I love it.

I never feel the need to go out and make some grand statement that I'm dark and twisty and complicated, because I'm not that either. It's just not as simple as ponies and rainbows, though I do love ponies and rainbows.

The human soul is an abyss

Outside, the ocean was crashing, waves hitting sand, then pulling back to sea. I thought of everything being washed away, again and again. We make such messes in this life, both accidentally and on purpose. But wiping the surface clean doesn't really make anything neater. It just masks what is below. It's only when you really dig down deep, go underground, that you can see who you really are.

What hidden, hoarded longings there are in all of us.

The heart of a man is like deep water