Woolf wonderfully captures the awe of a first time reader

In the Voyage Out, Woolf cleverly pokes fun at the way that Rachel reads Gibbon. Rachel is in awe of the words on the page exclaiming,  “ Never had any words been so vivid and so beautiful- Arabia Felix- Aethiopia.” (Woolf 175). Rachel reading Gibbon for the first time is so interesting to me because in this scene Woolf perfectly captures the awe of the unfamiliar reader. When I first began to venture more seriously into the world of classic novels, I did so without the help of a class, thus I did not have any guidance. Of course, I had encountered all the standard classics in class. But one summer I decided that I would start to read many of the more challenging classics on my own. After reading Woolf’s description of Rachel, I realized that she had in effect also described my experience with the books of that summer. I had not, at the time, realized that the books that I had picked were too challenging. Thus I was unable to understand and follow the plot of each book. Instead that summer became the summer that I would learn to appreciate and admire the beauty of words. I would sit outside in the sun and marvel at various authors and the skill with which they crafted each sentence, while not being able to understand a single plot line. The scene that Woolf writes is so realistic because it captures the experience that I and many other readers that are new to challenging materials have had.