What role does the pencil play in the essay?

The pencil serves as a grounding component in an essay that is largely cerebral and abstract. It is originally Woolf's motivation for leaving her house – she must buy a pencil – and becomes a signpost for readers as they navigate where they are located in time and space. When Woolf stops midway through the essay to announce the time and the fact that she is still traveling to purchase a pencil, she is grounding herself in reality as much as she is aiding the reader in following the essay. As such, the pencil becomes the link between the creative world of the mind and the real world in which the mind must exist, suggesting a necessary balance of fantasy and reality for the writer. By the end of the essay, the pencil has morphed into the concrete representation of...