This content downloaded from 129.21.35.191 on Sat, 02 May 2020 08:10:06 UTC All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms WRITERSANDTHEIRWORK ISOBELARMSTRONG GeneralEditor VIRGINIA WOOLF VIRGINIA WOOLF Laura Marcus Second Edition For Daniel, youngest of bibliophiles #Copyright1997and2004byLauraMarcus Secondedition2004 Firstpublishedin1997byNorthcoteHousePublishersLtd,HorndonHouse, Horndon,Tavistock,Devon,PL199NQ,UnitedKingdom. Tel:+44(0)1822810066 Fax:+44(0)1822810034. Allrightsreserved.Nopartofthisworkmaybereproducedorstoredinan informationretrievalsystem(otherthanshortextractsforthepurposesofreview) withouttheexpresspermissionofthePublishersgiveninwriting. BritishLibraryCataloguing-in-PublicationData AcataloguerecordforthisbookisavailablefromtheBritishLibrary ISBN074630966X TypesetbyPDQTypesetting,Newcastle-under-Lyme Contents Acknowledgements vi Biographical Outline vii Abbreviations x Note on the Text xii Prologue 1 1 Women’s Future, Women’s Fiction 7 2 A Shape that Fits 17 3 Women and Writing: A Room of One’s Own 41 4 Writing the City: ‘Street Haunting’ 61 and Mrs Dalloway 5 The Novel as Elegy: Jacob’s Room and 84 To the Lighthouse 6 Writing Lives: Orlando, The Waves and Flush 116 7 Fact and Fiction: The Years and Three Guineas 150 8 Into the Heart of Darkness: Between the Acts 175 Notes 187 Select Bibliography 199 Index 209 v Acknowledgements I am very grateful to Isobel Armstrong for inviting me to write aboutVirginiaWoolf:Ihavefounditanenrichingexperience.My thanks to Jan Montefiore and Alison Mark for their helpful comments on the manuscript and to William Outhwaite for advice, support, childcare, and much else. I would also like to offer (belated) thanks to Hilary Walford for her meticulous copy- editing of the first edition; to Bryony Randall, for her expert help in updating the bibliography for the new edition; and to Brian Hulme, for his patience and encouragement throughout. Finally, my publishers and I gratefully acknowledge the Trustees of the Literary Estate of Virginia Woolf and the Hogarth Press, Random House for permission to quote from the works of Virginia Woolf. vi Biographical Outline 1882 Born Adeline Virginia Stephen on 25 January in London, daughter of Julia Prinsep Stephen and Leslie Stephen, philosopher and biographer. Younger sisterof Vanessa (b. 30 May 1879) and Julian Thoby (b. 8 September 1880). 1883 Birth of brother, Adrian Leslie Stephen, 27 October. 1895 Death of Julia Stephen on 5 May. Virginia’s first breakdown in summer. Lease of Talland House, St Ives, is sold. 1897 Virginia begins to keep a regular diary. Marriage of Stella Duckworth, Virginia’s half-sister, to Jack Hills on 10 April. Stella dies of peritonitis on 19 July. Virginia begins studies of Greek and History at King’s College, London, in November. 1899 Thoby Stephen, Virginia’s brother, enters Trinity Col- lege, Cambridge, in October. 1902 VirginiabeginsprivatelessonsinGreekwithJanetCase. 1904 DeathofSirLeslieStephenon22February.Beginningof Virginia’s second serious breakdown in May. Stephen children move from 22 Hyde Park Gate to 46 Gordon Square, Bloomsbury. In October, Virginia goes to stay with aunt Caroline Emelia Stephen in Cambridge. She helps F. W. Maitland with his Life of Leslie Stephen. Virginia returns to London in December. Her first publication, an unsigned review, is printed in the Guardian. 1905 ThobyStephenstarts‘Thursday Evenings’at46Gordon Square: birth of ‘The Bloomsbury Group’. 1906 Virginia, Vanessa, and Violet Dickinson leave London vii BIOGRAPHICALOUTLINE for Greece on 8 September, joining Thoby and Adrian. ThobydiesoftyphoidfeverinLondonon20November. Vanessa agrees to marry Clive Bell 22 November. 1907 Vanessa marries Clive Bell 7 February. Virginia and Adrian move to 29 Fitzroy Square, London in April. Virginiaworks on her novel (Melymbrosia). 1908 Vanessa gives birth to a son, Julian Heward Bell, 8 February. 1910 In January Virginia begins work for Women’s Suffrage. Birth of Vanessa’s second son, Claudian [Quentin] Bell, 19 August. FirstPost-Impressionist exhibition, organized by Roger Fry, shown at Grafton Galleries, London, November–January 1911. 1911 In November, Virginia moves to 38 Brunswick Square, Bloomsbury, sharing house with Adrian, Maynard Key- nes, Duncan Grant, and Leonard Woolf. Virginia also takes lease of Asham House, Beddingham, Sussex. 1912 Marriage of Virginia and Leonard Woolf in London, 10 August. In second part of year, Virginia ill, depressed, and suicidal. Second Post-Impressionist exhibition, October–January 1913. 1915 In January, Virginia starts to keep a diary again and Virginia and Leonard decide to take Hogarth House, Richmond and to buy a printing press. Publication of first novel, The Voyage Out, in March. Virginia suffers severe breakdown and is ill for much of the year. 1917 In spring the Woolfs buy a printing press. Publication No.1ofTheHogarthPress–VirginiaWoolf’s‘TheMark on the Wall’ and Leonard Woolf’s ‘Three Jews’ – published in July. 1918 Birth of Vanessa’s daughter Angelica on 25 December. 1919 Hogarth Press publishes Virginia’s Kew Gardens in May. Woolfs buy Monk’s House, Rodmell, Sussex, in July. Night and Day published by Duckworth in October. 1920 First meeting of the Memoir Club takes place in March. 1921 Publication of Mondayor Tuesday in March. 1922 Jacob’s Room published in October by Hogarth Press. 1923 Death of Katherine Mansfield on 9 January. Leonard accepts literary editorship of The Nation. viii BIOGRAPHICALOUTLINE 1924 Woolfs move from Richmond to 52 Tavistock Square, Bloomsbury. Mr Bennett and Mrs Brown published in October. 1925 DeathofJacquesRaveraton7March.TheCommonReader is published in April. Mrs Dalloway is published in May. Virginia’s growing friendship with Vita Sackville-West. 1926 Virginia works on To the Lighthouse. Writes the ‘Time Passes’ section of the novel during the General Strike. 1927 To the Lighthouse published in May. Virginia starts to write Orlando in October. 1928 VirginiaawardedtheFeminaVieHeureuseprizeforTothe Lighthouse. Orlando published in October. Woolf gives CambridgelectureswhichbecomeARoomofOne’sOwn. The Well of Loneliness case is heard in November. 1929 Publication of A Room of One’s Own in October. 1930 Virginiaworks on The Waves. 1931 Publication of The Waves in October. 1932 Death of Lytton Strachey on January 21. Publication of The Common Reader: A Second Series in October. 1933 Virginiaworks on The Years. Flush published in October. 1934 VirginiacontinuesworkonTheYears.DeathofRogerFry on 9 September. 1935 Virginia’s play Freshwater is performed before friends in London. 1936 Woolf is ill for much of year. Works on The Years. 1937 The Years ispublished inMarch. JulianBelldiesinSpain on 18 July. 1938 Three Guineas published in June. 1939 WoolfsmovefromTavistockSquareto37Mecklenburgh Square, but with advance of war are primarily resident in Sussex. 1940 Publication of Roger Fry: A Biography in July. Mecklen- burgh Square is bombed and The Hogarth Press is moved to Letchworth, Hertfordshire. 1941 Virginia finishes Pointz Hall (Between the Acts) in February. Virginia commits suicide by drowning on 28 March. ix