INTRODUCTION

My name is Virginia Woolf. I’m a famous author that lived in the late nineteenth to early twentieth century – my years of prosperity were wedged in-between the WWI and WWII. For more information on me, my family, and my history, visit my exclusive interview or take a look at my short autobiographical page on this blog. 

            In this post, I will be exploring some photographs, pictures, and pieces of writing from my past. I hope you enjoy the artifacts!

-Virginia Woolf

NOTE ON THE ARTIFACTS: Each picture is presented first, with their number (#1-10) and a brief caption residing below. Where I have excerpts from my books, the number is presented first, with their caption below. Enjoy!

1. Virginia Woolf, painted by Vanessa Bell

This is a beautiful oil portrait of me in an armchair painted by my sister, Vanessa Bell. My sister was a wonderfully talented painter, equal gifted as I was in writing. This portrait was painted when I was living in Bloomsbury, London, along with my siblings. In Bloomsbury, I formed a group christened – rather unoriginally – the Bloomsbury Group. We made up an odd assortment of radicals and shocked many conservatives. But though we were laughed off as quacks, not to be taken seriously (hmph!) we knew then what the stodgy old misers did not: our way was the future, and they would be left in the dust if they didn’t move along with the times.

2. Virginia Woolf, photographed by George Charles Beresford

This is a photograph of me taken by George Charles Beresford. He took quite a few portraits of me during his lifetime. In those days, photography was rather expensive – unfortunately – and posing for a picture was an exhausting procedure. Still, I do believe it was well worth the struggle, especially years after I posed. When I was young, I did have a touch of beauty (if I do say so myself). It’s nice to look back upon myself as a young, healthy, beautiful woman, instead of the fragile, bitter thing I would later become.

3. Virginia Woolf; Sir Leslie Stephen, photographed by George Charles Beresford

This is another photograph taken by George Charles Beresford. This particular photo is of me and my father, Sir Leslie Stephen, before his death in 1904. My father was a bit of a bully; he’d push my mother around more than he ought, not to mention his children. He was also a bit mad – he’d mutter verses of poetry while climbing the stairs and walking around the house, in a queer singsong. (Not that I’m much of one to talk, with my history of being a bit… Well, let’s just say off and keep it at that, shall we?) Still, my first novel, The Voyage Out (1915), might have never been published without him, and as such, I have my father to thank for much of my following success. I like to look back upon this old photograph and remember him in my better moments.

4. Virginia Woolf; Leonard Sidney Woolf, photographed by Gisèle Freund

This is a photograph taken by Gisèle Freund in 1939. Unlike the previous photograph taken in 1902, I’m not quite so healthful and beautiful; my hair has quite gone gray, and I’ve more than a few wrinkles to my name. My husband, Leonard Woolf, sits opposite of me. He really was a lovely man, though I didn’t always treat him as I ought… Anyway, this photograph was taken toward the end of my life. I wouldn’t live to see the close of the Second World War, and at this time, the war had just begun.

5. To the Lighthouse cover design, designed by Vanessa Bell

This is the first edition cover of one of my novels, To the Lighthouse, created for its first edition in 1927. That first edition was printed by Hogarth Press, a printing press my husband Leonard Woolf and I set up in our days spent living outside of the hustle and bustle of London (much to my chagrin). The cover was designed by my sister, Vanessa Bell, the very same who painted that marvelous portrait seen above. To The Lighthouse (1927) was one of my best novels. To the Lighthouse and Mrs Dalloway (1925) mark two of my most critically-acclaimed books, and are the real surviving remnants of my legacy in the world today (in my opinion, at the very least).

6. Excerpt from beginning of To the Lighthouse

 ‘“Yes, of course, if it’s fine tomorrow,” said Mrs. Ramsay. “But you’ll have to be up with the lark,” she added.    To her son these words conveyed an extraordinary joy, as if it were settled, the expedition were bound to take place, and the wonder to which he had looked forward, for years and years it seemed, was, after a night’s darkness and a day’s sail, within touch. Since he belonged, even at the age of six, to that great clan which cannot keep this feeling separate from that, but must let future prospects, with their joys and sorrows, cloud what is actually at hand, since to such people even in earliest childhood any turn in the wheel of sensation has the power to crystallise and transfix the moment upon which its gloom or radiance rests, James Ramsay, sitting on the floor cutting out pictures from the illustrated catalogue of the Army and Navy stores, endowed the picture of a refrigerator, as his mother spoke, with heavenly bliss. It was fringed with joy. The wheelbarrow, the lawnmower, the sound of poplar trees, leaves whitening before rain, rooks cawing, brooms knocking, dresses rustling — all these were so coloured and distinguished in his mind that he had already his private code, his secret language, though he appeared the image of stark and uncompromising severity, with his high forehead and his fierce blue eyes, impeccably candid and pure, frowning slightly at the sight of human frailty, so that his mother, watching him guide his scissors neatly round the refrigerator, imagined him all red and ermine on the Bench or directing a stern and momentous enterprise in some crisis of public affairs.   “But,” said his father, stopping in front of the drawing-room window, “it won’t be fine.”’

-To the Lighthouse (1927), pages 3-4

This is an excerpt from my book To the Lighthouse (1927), the book whose cover I featured in my previous artifact. This is the very beginning of the book; the opening line, when I’m just starting to provide an exposition, sentences, and dialogue. Here, I’m coloring in a black-and-white outline, a setting undescribed, wholly new. Notice my description: “It was fringed with joy. The wheelbarrow, the lawnmower, the sound of poplar trees, leaves whitening before rain, rooks cawing, brooms knocking, dresses rustling – all these were so coloured and distinguished in his mind" (3). Also, if you will, turn your attention to my lack of perspective. I dip into James Ramsay’s consciousness, but never dig my fingers in and take hold. Instead, I lightly brush the surface, achieving a stream of consciousness but not a true perspective. It is this nature for which I will become famous.

7. Mrs Dalloway cover design, by Vanessa Bell

As I mentioned before, I’ve had two great triumphs in writing (in my opinion). Of course, I’ve got a few handfuls of small victories – accompanied by small losses, as victories so often are – but there are two books I consider to be my greatest achievement. One of them, To the Lighthouse (1927), I presented in both cover format, and gave you a glimpse at what lay in the book. This is Mrs. Dalloway (1925), my other great triumph. The photo above is the first cover edition, again designed by my sister, Vanessa Bell, painter extraordinaire, and like the first edition of To the Lighthouse, it was first published by Hogarth Press. This is when I was really beginning to experiment and play around with word structure and streams of consciousness. Mrs. Dalloway revolves around a day in the life of a society hostess, shifting points of view often and frequently, while interposing words with lyrical descriptions. I was quite successful with the technique – I won’t blush to admit it – and I used the first inklings of uniqueness that appeared here to structure To the Lighthouse.

8. Excerpt from beginning of Mrs Dalloway

‘Mrs Dalloway said she would buy the flowers herself.
   For Lucy had her work cut out for her. The doors would be taken off their hinges; Rumpelmayer's men were coming. And then, thought Clarissa Dalloway, what a morning—fresh as if issued to children on a beach.
   What a lark! What a plunge! For so it had always seemed to her, when, with a little squeak of the hinges, which she could hear now, she had burst open the French windows and plunged at Bourton into the open air. How fresh, how calm, stiller than this of course, the air was in the early morning; like the flap of a wave; the kiss of a wave; chill and sharp and yet (for a girl of eighteen as she then was) solemn, feeling as she did, standing there at the open window, that something awful was about to happen; looking at the flowers, at the trees with the smoke winding off them and the rooks rising, falling; standing and looking until Peter Walsh said, "Musing among the vegetables?"—was that it?—"I prefer men to cauliflowers"—was that it? He must have said it at breakfast one morning when she had gone out on to the terrace—Peter Walsh. He would be back from India one of these days, June or July, she forgot which, for his letters were awfully dull; it was his sayings one remembered; his eyes, his pocket-knife, his smile, his grumpiness and, when millions of things had utterly vanished—how strange it was!—a few sayings like this about cabbages.
   She stiffened a little on the kerb, waiting for Durtnall's van to pass. A charming woman, Scrope Purvis thought her (knowing her as one does know people who live next door to one in Westminster); a touch of the bird about her, of the jay, blue-green, light, vivacious, though she was over fifty, and grown very white since her illness. There she perched, never seeing him, waiting to cross, very upright.’

-Mrs Dalloway (1925), pages 4-5

This is an excerpt from Mrs Dalloway (1925), the very same cover I have directly above. Like the excerpt I featured from To the Lighthouse (1927), this is from the first few pages of the book; the very beginning, in fact, from the first line. Notice here the first hints of the consciousness I would later adapt in To the Lighthouse. “How fresh, how calm, stiller than this of course, the air was in the early morning; like the flap of a wave; the kiss of a wave; chill and sharp and yet (for a girl of eighteen as she then was) solemn, feeling as she did, standing there at the open window, that something awful was about to happen; looking at the flowers, at the trees with the smoke winding off them and the rooks rising, falling; standing and looking until Peter Walsh said, "Musing among the vegetables?"—was that it?—"I prefer men to cauliflowers"—was that it? He must have said it at breakfast one morning when she had gone out on to the terrace—Peter Walsh.” Also, if you will, look at my shifts in perspective from first Mrs Dalloway and then to Scrope Purvis. These are the bones that would serve to lay the framework for To the Lighthouse, though they were here executed well enough (if I do say so).

9. Person – Julia Margaret Cameron

This is a picture of Julia Margaret Cameron, esteemed early photographer. My family is a confederation of art-hungry people, from my sister, the artist Vanessa Bell, to myself, to my mother, a model who belonged to a bit of a radical group, and on occasion, my father, who was prone to loving poetry. Julia Margaret Cameron is another name to add to that list. She was my mother’s aunt and godmother, my great-aunt by relation. She was first given a camera in the 1860s, and throughout that time, she made something of herself. However, she also sat for paintings, showing the above oil on canvas. She was a beauty, well-worth the trouble of painting (in my opinion, at least).

10. Julia Prinsep Stephen (née Jackson, formerly Mrs Duckworth)

This is a picture of my late mother, bless her soul. She was a wonderful person, and very beautiful. She was the niece and goddaughter of Julia Margaret Cameron, you know, the same woman I feature in the picture above. Like her aunt and godmother, she belonged to an artistic group which gathered at a residence called Little Holland House. My mother used to sit for paintings and photographs – that’s what happens when you’re as beautiful as she is, I suppose. She sat for Pre-Raphaelite artists. As such, pictures of her survive even today, and though it’s a bit blurry – nothing like the resolution of those modern photographs far above – you can still catch hints of her true appearance here and there; the woman instead of the poser.

10. Julia Prinsep Stephen (née Jackson, formerly Mrs Duckworth)

This is a picture of my late mother, Julia Prinsep Stephen, bless her soul. She was a wonderful person, and very beautiful. She was the niece and goddaughter of Julia Margaret Cameron, you know, the same woman I feature in the picture above. Like her aunt and godmother, she belonged to an artistic group which gathered at a residence called Little Holland House. My mother used to sit for paintings and photographs – that’s what happens when you’re as beautiful as she is, I suppose. She sat for Pre-Raphaelite artists. As such, pictures of her survive even today, and though it’s a bit blurry – nothing like the resolution of those modern photographs far above – you can still catch hints of her true appearance here and there; the woman instead of the poser. 

Bibliography

1.      1. Bell, Vanessa. Virginia Woolf. 1912. National Portrait Gallery, London. National Portrait Gallery. Web. 1 December 2015. <http://www.npg.org.uk/collections/search/portrait/mw08084/Virginia-Woolf?LinkID=mp04923&role=sit&rNo=6>.

2.      2. Briggs, Julia. Virginia Woolf: An Inner Life. London: Penguin, 2005. Print.

3.     3.  Rahn, Josh. “The Bloomsbury Group.” –Literature Periods and Movements. Jalic, Inc., n.d. Web. 1 December 2015. <http://www.online-literature.com/periods/bloomsbury.php>.

4.      4. Beresford, George Charles. Virginia Woolf. 1902. National Portrait Gallery, London. National Portrait Gallery. Web. 1 December 2015. <http://www.npg.org.uk/collections/search/portrait/mw19901/Virginia-Woolf?LinkID=mp04923&role=sit&rNo=14>.

5.      5. Beresford, George Charles. Virginia Woolf; Sir Leslie Stephen. 1902. National Portrait Gallery, London. National Portrait Gallery. Web. 1 December 2015. <http://www.npg.org.uk/collections/search/portrait/mw19867/Virginia-Woolf-Sir-Leslie-Stephen?LinkID=mp04923&role=sit&rNo=13>.

6.      6. Heitman, Danny. “Virginia Woolf Was More Than Just a Women’s Writer.” HUMANITIES. HUMANITIES, May/June 2015. Web. 1 December 2015. <http://www.neh.gov/humanities/2015/mayjune/feature/virginia-woolf-was-more-just-womens-writer>.

7.     7.  "Virginia Woolf and Leslie Stephen: A Father's Contribution to Psychosis and Genius." National Center for Biotechnology Information. U.S. National Library of Medicine, Oct. 1986. Web. 1 December 2015. <http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/3771329>.

8.      8. Freund, Gisèle. Virginia Woolf; Leonard Sidney Woolf. 1939. National Portrait Gallery, London. National Portrait Gallery. Web. 1 December 2015. <http://www.npg.org.uk/collections/search/portrait/mw08282/Virginia-Woolf-Leonard-Sidney-Woolf?LinkID=mp04923&role=sit&rNo=11>.

9.      9. Bell, Vanessa. “To the Lighthouse cover design.” Cover design. Mantex. Hogarth Press, 1927. Web. 5 December 2015.  <http://www.mantex.co.uk/2010/01/29/to-the-lighthouse/>.

1.    10. “Virginia Woolf.” InfoBritain. n.p., n.d. Web. 8 Nov. 2015. <http://www.infobritain.co.uk/Virginia_Woolf_Biography_And_Visits.htm>.

1.  11. Woolf, Virginia. To the Lighthouse.  London: Hogarth, 1927. Print.

1.   12. Johnson, Roy. “Virginia Woolf greatest works- introductory notes.” Mantex. Mantex, 24 September 2009. Web. 8 Nov. 2015. <http://www.mantex.co.uk/2009/09/24/virginia-woolf-greatest-works/>.

1.   13. Bell, Vanessa. “Mrs Dalloway cover design.” Cover design. Carol’s Notes. Hogarth Press, 1925. Web. 6 December 2015. < http://www.carolsnotes.net/2015/06/classics-review-mrs-dalloway-by-virginia-woolf/>.

1.  14. Woolf, Virginia. Mrs Dalloway. London: Hogarth, 1925. Print.

1.  15. “Person - Julia Prinsep Stephen (née Jackson, formerly Mrs Duckworth).” National Portrait Gallery. National Portrait Gallery, n.d. Web. 6 December 2015. < http://www.npg.org.uk/collections/search/person/mp17975/julia-prinsep-stephen-nee-jackson-formerly-mrs-duckworth>.

1.  16. “Person – Julia Margaret Cameron.” National Portrait Gallery. National Portrait Gallery, n.d. Web. 6 December 2015. <http://www.npg.org.uk/collections/search/person/mp00717>.

1.  17, “Person - Julia Prinsep Stephen (née Jackson, formerly Mrs Duckworth).” National Portrait Gallery. National Portrait Gallery, n.d. Web. 6 December 2015. < http://www.npg.org.uk/collections/search/person/mp17975/julia-prinsep-stephen-nee-jackson-formerly-mrs-duckworth>.

1.  18. The London Photographic Company. Julia Prinsep Stephen (née Jackson, formerly Mrs Duckworth). 1867. National Portrait Gallery, London. National Portrait Gallery. Web. 6 December 2015. <http://www.npg.org.uk/collections/search/portrait/mw124115/Julia-Prinsep-Stephen-ne-Jackson-formerly-Mrs-Duckworth?LinkID=mp17975&role=sit&rNo=0>.