Chapter 2: The Mark on the Wall

Answer. The author, Virginia Woolf, can only reflect the deeply hidden truths of human realities through characters created by the writers. Existence often requires the radiance of emotions, and a description of reality often fails to evoke the author’s feelings through their work. While reflections, on the other hand, help people to examine their thoughts or feelings. According to the author, future writers will look into the depths, explore the facts, pursue their illusions, and leave behind the ancient detailed depiction of reality. Hence, according to the author, an account of reflections is more important than a description of reality.

Answer. The author takes Shakespeare, the most famous Elizabethan playwright, as an example to describe the objects and habits of the past era, which brings only a ghostly unreality to the author. The renowned writer, Shakespeare, sat in an armchair by the fireplace, clutching his forehead and the sky above his head, full of incredible and suspicious ideas and inspirations. She believes that a person will naturally be inspired by the environment or experience rather than some inspiring phenomenon. The author collected some examples from ‘Whitaker’s Table of Precedency’ to describe this untrue spirit. Traditional concepts such as good and evil, heaven and hell, and God and the devil are invalid and seem to be describing untrue.

Answer. The narrator looks at the life of the tree, while the fish emphasises the stillness of life and the breath of thought. She says, “Wood is a pleasant thing to think about. It comes from a tree, and trees grow, and we don’t know how they grow.” Trees grow independently without any external factors affecting them, which describes how nature works soundlessly without disturbing the world around them. Further, she explains it using the imagery of a fish, saying, “I like to think of the fish balanced against the stream like flags blown out,” describing the still life present in a current world that is often left undiscovered.

Answer. In this chapter, the author attempts to describe the “Stream of mindfulness.” First of all, the author thinks deeply about solving the mystery of the marks on the wall, representing the interest of the individual’s mind and the height of the human psychological process. In order to solve a small mystery, the human mind plunges into an unimaginable depth. A smaller secret, “The mark on the wall,”  allows her to delve into history, Shakespeare’s writings, traditional norms, etc. All these ideas will enable her to look deeper into the future. Thus, she discusses how nature penetrates our thought processes and stimulates us to take action, and tells us the infinite nature of human thought in terms of action.

Answer. Yes, it is true that not seeing the obvious can lead a perceptive mind to reflect upon more philosophical issues. For example, the story “The Mark on the Wall” revolves around the mark present on the wall from the author’s vision. The mark on the wall, which is the main plot of the story, could have easily been solved by the narrator, examining the mark more closely but she instead investigates using several mental processes to solve the mystery behind it. Instead, she reflects upon more philosophical issues. She goes back to ancient times, to the future and is in a fluctuating state of mind reflecting upon philosophies and, at the same time, trying to solve the mystery behind the mark. At the end of the story, it is revealed that it’s just the snail who made the mark, creating a plot. However, with her interpretations and perspective, the author reflected upon many philosophical issues throughout the entire process.