Virginia Woolf

Virginia Woolf was born Adeline Virginia Stephen on 25th January 1882 and was the youngest daughter of Julia [Duckworth] and Sir Leslie Stephen, author and critic, best known as editor of the Dictionary of National Biography. It was a second marriage for both her parents and Virginia had three much older Duckworth siblings, George, Stella and Gerald, as well as a disabled half sister Laura Stephen who was eventually institutionalized. Virginia had two older siblings, Vanessa and Toby, and a younger brother Adrian. Her early years were marred by bereavement. Virginia’s mother died when she was only 13, and her sister Stella two years later. Always fragile, Virginia had a complete nervous breakdown after her mother’s death, and was ill again after the death of her older sister. Her father’s death in 1904 provoked a major collapse and she was still recovering when her brother Toby died in 1906. The three remaining Stephen siblings set up home on their own and Virginia began to write her first novel, The Voyage Out, published in 1915 by her half brother Gerald Duckworth. Vanessa married Clive Bell and devoted her life to painting. The sisters remained very close.

Virginia married author and critic Leonard Woolf in 1914 and though the marriage was consummated, within a few weeks it became a ‘marriage blanc’. A major breakdown after the publication of her first novel, confirmed Leonard’s belief that Virginia’s mental state was too fragile to have children. Many believed that episodes of sexual abuse as a child, involving her half brothers, were to blame for Virginia’s dislike of sex. Virginia later had several intense relationships with women, notably Vita Sackville West.

It was Lytton Strachey who suggested that Virginia might like to meet Katherine Mansfield and they began a tentative friendship in the autumn of 1916. By 1917 they had begun to meet regularly and talk about their work together. Katherine admired Virginia’s ‘passion for writing’; Virginia commended Katherine’s ‘fierce’ dedication to her art. Both women were very competitive. Virginia saw Katherine as her main rival and had to reassure her sister Vanessa that ‘my jealousy ... is only a film on the surface beneath which is nothing but pure generosity’.
When Virginia and Leonard set up the Hogarth Press, Katherine was the first person they asked for a story - The Aloe was published in 1918. By the time they met, Katherine was already very ill with tuberculosis and had to spend most of her time abroad. This was a big obstacle for their developing relationship, generating misunderstandings and feelings of regret on both sides. The importance of their friendship can’t be underestimated. Katherine told Virginia; ‘You are the only woman with whom I long to talk work. There will never be another.’ When she died in 1923, Virginia wrote that there was ‘no point in writing any more ... Katherine won’t read it. Katherine’s my rival no longer.’

Lyndall Gordon’s Virginia Woolf: A Writer’s Life is an excellent biography. For Virginia’s relationship with Katherine see also Hermione Lee’s biography Virginia Woolf, (Chapter 22, ‘Katherine’), and Angela Smith’s A Public of Two: Katherine Mansfield and Virginia Woolf.