Virginia Woolf which would become central to During the inter-war period Virginia novelist, critic, essayist (1882-1941) activities of the Bloomsbury group. was at the center of literary society. The Bloomsbury group was initially Virginia Woolf (1882-1941), was a Virginia began to write for the based at the Gordon Square residence British novelist as well as a dis- Times Literary Supplement in of Virginia and her sister Vanessa. tinguished feminist essayist, critic, and 1905. In 1912 she married the a central figure of the Bloomsbury political theorist Leonard Woolf Virginia Woolf's concern with group. and published her first book, The feminist thematics are dominant in A Voyage Out in 1915. In 1919 Room Of One's Own (1929), which Virginia Woolf was born on January appeared Night And Day, a realistic deals with the obstacles and 25, 1882 in London, as the daughter of novel set in London, contrasting the prejudices that have hindered women Julia Jackson Duckworth, a member of lives of two friends, Katherine and writers; the last chapter explores the the Duckworth publishing family, and Mary. Jacob's Room (1922) was possibility of an androgynous mind. Leslie Stephen, a literary critic and the based upon the life and death of her Three Guineas (1938) examines the founder of the Dictionary of National brother Toby. necessity for women to make a claim Biography. Virginia was educated at for their own history and literature. home by her father and grew up at the With To the Lighthouse (1927) and Orlando (1928), a fantasy novel, family home at Hyde Park Gate. Her The Waves (1931), Virginia traces the career of the androgynous mother died when she was in her early established herself as one of the protagonist from a masculine identity teens. Stella Duckworth, her half leading writers of modernism. In within the Elizabethan court to a sister, took her mother's place, but these works Virginia developed feminine identity in 1928. Virginia died two years later. Leslie Stephen, innovative literary techniques in was also prolific as an essayist, her father, suffered a slow death from order to reveal women's experience publishing some 500 essays in cancer. When her brother Toby died in and find an alternative to the male- periodicals and collections, beginning 1906, she had a prolonged mental dominated views of reality. Mrs. in 1905. breakdown, the first of many that Dalloway (1925) is formed of a would mark her life. Following the giant web of thoughts of several After her final attack of mental illness death of her father in 1904, Virginia groups of people during the course Virginia loaded her pockets with moved with her sister Vanessa and two of a single day. stones and drowned herself in the brothers to the house in Bloomsbury, River Ouse near her Sussex home on March 28, 1941. Some thoughts from Virginia Woolf: “ A woman must have money and a room of her own if she is to write “Once conform, once do what other fiction.” people do because they do it, and a - Virginia Woolf, A Room of One’s Virginia lethargy steals over all the finer nerves Own (1929) and faculties of the soul.” - Virginia Woolf, “Montaigne,” The “The beauty of the world…has two st Common Reader, 1 series (1925) edges, one of laughter, one of anguish, cutting the heart asunder.” Woolf “It is in our idleness, in our dreams, - Virginia Woolf, A Room of One’s that the submerged truth sometimes Own (1929) Writer, essayist comes to the top.” (1882-1941) - Virginia Woolf, A Room of One’s “On the outskirts of every agony sits Own (1929) some observer fellow who points.” - Virginia Woolf, The Waves

“Intimacy is a difficult art.” (1931) - Virginia Woolf, “Geraldine and Jane,” The Common Reader, 2nd series Some of Virginia Woolf’s works (1932) include: A Room of One’s Own “All extremes are dangerous.” Mrs. Dalloway

- Virginia Woolf, “Montaigne,” The Orlando Common Reader, 1st series (1925) Three Guineas To the Lighthouse “I would venture to guess that Anon, Between the Acts who wrote so many poems without Jacob’s Room signing them, was often a woman.” The Waves - Virginia Woolf, A Room of One’s Own (1929) “If you do not tell the truth about yourself you cannot tell it about other people.”