The speaker begins to tell a story or anecdote about this time when he went to see a really smart astronomer<span> speak. The word "</span>learn'd<span>" </span>means<span> "smart" or, more accurately, "well-educated."</span>
Tom Wolfe influenced the development of the New Journalism movement in the United States
They are both examples of abstract nouns
In the second sentence, the image used by the author is a metaphor which is a figure of speech that describes an action in a way that isn't literally true, but helps him to explain the idea of how the woman takes out her feeling of love, probably hidden for a lot of time.