Virginia Woolf: A Writer's Life

(Paperback)

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Only writing, Virginia Woolf said, could compose 'the synthesis of my being'. Lyndall Gordon reveals an explorer of 'the infinite oddity of the human position' and, specifically, the more hidden problems and possibilities of women. Integrating new material - diary, memoirs, unpublished sketches, and drafts of novels - this book brings out the experiences that shaped Virginia Woolf's work: the family deaths that shut off her youth as a well of memory, the muted suffering of a Victorian girl, and the volcanic matter of her madness. It looks at her unusual education with her eccentric father, Leslie Stephen; the formative bond with her sister, the artist Vanessa Bell; her imaginative marriage to Leonard Woolf; above all, her attachments to the dead, so as to find the sources of her creativity and to show how Virginia Woolf transformed private memories into classic works of art.

Reviews

'Lyndall Gordon must be one of the most accomplished literary biographers of this generation... Outstanding and stimulating... Excellent treatment of the woman and her art' British Book News 'sensitive and original' Hermione Lee, TES 'At last the most filigree of artists is given the substance that several decades of anecdotage and gossip have trivialised' Roger Lewis, Punch 'a most perceptive book which greatly adds to our knowledge and understanding' London Magazine

Author Bio

Author of the prizewinning biographies ELIOT'S EARLY YEARS, ELIOT'S NEW LIFE and VIRGINIA WOOLF: A WRITER'S LIFE. Born and raised in Cape Town, South Africa, Lyndall received her doctorate from Columbia University and is a fellow of St Hilda's College, Oxford.