Virginia Woolf: Pioneering 20th century modernist, feminist writer

Born on January 1882 in South Kensington, London, to editor and critic Sir Leslie Stephen and photographer Julia Prinsep Stephen, Adeline Virginia Stephen was educated in a literate, well-connected family who, as freethinkers, rejected dogmatic beliefs. Virginia’s life was moulded by her family’s annual summer migrations to the Talland House on Cornwall coast. The relocation gave her chance to experience dualities such as winter and summer, repression and freedom, city and country.

Career
Virginia Stephen began writing professionally in 1900. The first of her writings was a journalistic account of a visit to the renowned British literary family of the Brontes sisters— Charlotte, Emily and Anne, which was published anonymously in 1904. Following year, she began writing for The Times Literary Supplement. In 1915, she published her first novel— The Voyage Out, originally named, Melymbrosia. The book was mostly about life experiences. She continued writings novels, self publishing most of them, and, with passage of time, carved a niche in the Victorian literary society. In 1928, she started taking a grassroot approach to advocate feminism by addressing undergraduate women in various colleges. Her non-fiction works, such as A Room of One’s Own (1929) and Three Guineas (1938), bring to the fore the hardships faced by women as writers and intellectuals. In 1940-41, during the bombing of London she wrote Between the Acts which regarded war as a threat to art and humanity. Though the book raised several questions, she later felt that its significance was diminished in the light that England was on the cusp of invasion. It was due to such horrors of war that she found it tough to write. Virginia’s life was also plagued by mental illnesses.

Major Works
Her most noteworthy works are Mrs Dalloway (1925), Orlando (1928) and her essay, To the Lighthouse (1927) , and A Room of One’s Own (1929). Mrs Dalloway explores mental illness, feminism, homosexuality and existentialism through her titular character, Clarissa Dalloway and Septimus Warren Smith. To the Lighthouse encompasses the Ramsay family and their visits to the Isle of Skye in Scotland. It deals with subjects of loss, subjectivity, the nature of art and complexity of experience and relationships. Orlando is a high-spirited romp inspired by the tumultuous family history of the aristocratic poet and novelist Vita Sackville-West, Woolf’s close friend. A Room of One’s Own, a feminist text compels readers to consider women’s lack of free expression.

Awards and Achievements
Her work, To the Lighthouse, was ranked 15th by the Modern Library in 1998, on its list of 100 best English language novels of the 20th century. The Tikde magazine also chose it as one of the best English language novels published between 1923 and 2005.

Personal Life
Virginia Stephen married writer Leonard Woolf in 1912. They shared a close bond and led a contented married life which lasted until her death in 1941. The duo also collaborated professionally and founded the Hogarth Press. She suffered from depression and ended her life in 1941, aged 59.

INTERESTING FACTS

• At a time when women were rarely educated Virginia Stephen (Woolf) studied Greek, Latin, and German, continental and English history, at the King’s College, London.
• She grew up in a family environment heavily influenced by the Victorian literary society. Her home had a library from which children were taught classics and English literature.
• Virginia Stephen lost her mother when she was 13, and suffered a second blow when her sister passed away soon after. Those setbacks probably triggered her first instances of nervous breakdowns.
• She was a fan of concerts and opera. While writing her book— The Waves, she listened to Beethoven. Other characteristic features of her writings are her lyrical style and knack for experimental writing.
• A 1998 book titled The Hours, written by Michael Cunningham, won a Pulitzer Prize. It dealt with three women from different generations affected by Woolf’s novel titled Mrs. Dalloway. It went on to become a movie.