Virginia Woolf Death Of The Moth Essay

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Virginia Woolf, one of the greatest twentieth-century writers, in her most famous work of nonfiction, The Death of the Moth, studies and contemplates the seeming insignificance of a day-moths life to her own, and ponders the meaning of life, death, and her own existence because of her thoughtful observation. She describes the moth as a set of “tiny legs… useless to try to do anything” but able to give forth an “extraordinary effort”, which makes Woolf’s own efforts feel surprisingly useless as she knows that some greater power than herself waits, “indifferent, impersonal” and absolutely nonchalant as to whether Woolf herself lives or dies. Woolf’s purpose in writing this nonfiction narrative is to briefly contemplate the divine through a clever analogy of herself to both a moth and the divine, and to show how the two seemingly dissimilar roles are not actually that different. Woolf employs a tone of hesitant admiration as she cannot help but to ruminate on the nature of her existence, but realizes that she has as much control or ability to understand it as a moth does to it’s own existence. Most of this aforementioned rumination occurs within the 5th and last paragraph. Indeed, before that paragraph, Woolf spends most of her time …show more content…
The first sentences are quick and lucidly clear. Woolf is excited about her idea and line of thought. Then, a pattern of rhetorical questions. Woolf dives deeper into her vocational meanderings. In the mix, a periodic sentence, adumbrative of Woolf’s speculation leading up to her precipitous realization. More quick sentences, more questions, a few more realizations, and she ends with an indirect quote of the moth, “O yes, he seemed to say, death is stronger that I am.” The quote here is exceptionally profound relative to the other sentences because it finalizes Woolf’s musings of thought and finalizes Woolf’s metaphor of herself to the

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