Virginia Woolf: Ambivalent Activist

2016 | Biography

Virginia Woolf taught history at Morley College for adult education; addressed envelopes in an adult suffrage office in 1910; she was the treasurer of the Rodmell Women's Institute and had a life-long affiliation with the Women's Co-operative Guild. Yet the compelling details of this activity have been critically neglected owing to an emphasis on the politics of Woolf's writing, rather than her actual participation. Responding to this significant gap in Woolf scholarship and drawing on a wealth of archival material, this book establishes the details of Woolf's participation with these four organisations and sets this activism within the contexts of the institutional moments in which she worked.

As well as tracing Woolf's career as an activist across 45 years, this book also explores the consistent but often contradictory way in which this participation is written into a range of Woolf's short stories, novels and essays including 'Report on Teaching at Morley College: 'Memoirs of a Novelist', 'The Journal of Mistress Joan Martyn', Melymbrosia, The Voyage Out, Night and Day, The Years, 'Introductory Letter', 'On Being Ill', 'Cook Sketch', the 'Dreadnought Hoax Talk',' The Leaning Tower', and Between the Acts.

Clara Jones (Author)