"I feel so intensely the delights of shutting oneself up in a little world of one's own, with pictures and music and everything beautiful." -Virginia Woolf, The Voyage Out (1915) The Voyage Out (1915), Virginia Woolf's first novel, is about Mr. and Mrs. Ambrose and their niece, Rachel, who travel by sea from London to a South American resort. It describes Rachel's journey of self-discovery from her sheltered life in London to freedom and discovery, which reflects Woolf's own journey from a repressed childhood to intellectual inspiration.